Weekend Reading #76

 Some longer or more involved reading:

•  This week, we are starting out as usual with Greg Ellifritz's Weekend Knowledge Dump for this week. Some of the links that caught my attention in particular:
• Part 3 of a video series on terminal ballistics and tactical anatomy.
• An article discussing what is called the violin technique to reloading a shotgun, given directions for both right handed and left handed shooters.
• An explanation of the blank paper drill and how to shoot and score it--as well as its dry fire equivalent, the blank wall drill. The idea is to remove a specific target point so you can concentrate on sight alignment and consistency. 
• An explanation of height over bore and why your rifle shoots low at close distances.
• And a piece from the Daily Mail on protecting yourself from pickpockets and how pickpocket teams work.  
• In my long ago article, "Concealed Carry--No Elegant Solution," I noted that most of the concealed carry articles I saw in gun magazines were written by then-current and former law enforcement whose experience with concealed carry was working as a plain clothes officer, and concluded that "[p]eople with law enforcement backgrounds have little useful to say about concealed carry for the average person." I didn't mean this as a disparagement, but that the circumstances of being a plain clothes sworn police officer was different enough from that of private civilian carrying a concealed weapon that a lot of what they had to say just wasn't applicable to the normal concealed carrier. I guess I didn't expressly state it in my article, but I remember from the time I was first learning about concealed carry that the occasional article from someone that worked as a body guard or an undercover police officer were far more useful. So, with that long winded background, Greg has linked to an article entitled "Concealed Carry Considerations for the Law Enforcement Officer tasked with Close In Protection"--i.e., officers acting as body guards--that covers many of the aspects that you as civilian carrying concealed or wanting a weapon to protect your family will need to consider. I recommend reading it.
• I've seen a lot of recommendations for videos on the SKS pop up on my YouTube feed recently, so it was interesting to see that Greg links to an article from Guns America about the SKS discussing a bit of its history, the countries that produced it, and issues with parts interchangeability. However, there was a point that was so wrong that I have to comment, and that is the comparison with the M1 Carbine. This is incorrect on two levels. First, the SKS was intended to replace the Mosin-Nagant as the primary infantry weapon, unlike the M1 Carbine which was intended as a weapon for support troops. Second, the SKS is not small and lightweight such that it cannot easily be pressed into the same role as the M1 Carbine. 
• Speaking of the M1 Carbine, Greg links to an article that has an in-depth look at the M1 Carbine cartridge and what makes it so enjoyable to shoot. 
• Greg also has a new "free books" column with links to Kindle books that are (or were at the time he published it) available at no cost at Amazon with an emphasis on prepping and self-defense related non-fiction and thrillers for the fiction. 
• "In France And Britain, Multiculturalism Is Leading To Authoritarianism"--The Federalist. The article mostly focuses on the fact that "[t]he leaders of France and Britain are calling for censorship regimes because enforcing multiculturalism requires suppressing freedom." The author begins, of course, by noting the riots and protests in France, explaining:

    The rioters are not calling for education reform or protesting poor classroom conditions, despite what the corporate press has reported. These are not “school protests” but rather an intifada. The rioters themselves are the footsoldiers of a “Red-Green alliance” between the radical left and pro-Palestinian Islamist activists, whose shared goal is to clear the ground for a “New France” that will replace the actually existing French nation.

    This “New France” is largely a Third World horde, imported in successive waves beginning in the 1970s, when France scrapped its immigration regime and adopted a family reunification system similar to the United States’ Hart-Celler Act of 1965. In the ensuing decades, and especially since 2000, France has seen a massive influx of migrants from its former colonial holdings in North Africa and the Middle East. These people have for the most part refused to assimilate, and instead have formed discrete Muslim enclaves, retaining the ethnic and religious identity of their homelands. They are not French in any meaningful sense, and do not wish to be.

    The consequences of this failure of assimilation and acculturation are now apparent on the streets of French cities. For more than a week now the unassimilated children and grandchildren of migrants from the Third World have been  attacking police and firefighters (and teachers in some cases), burning schools and public buildings to the ground, and calling for the overthrow of the French Republic. They have done so in many cases while waving Palestinian and Algerian flags, and chanting Antifa and pro-Hamas slogans. 

    However, they are not doing this all on their own. French authorities said last week the riots were being organized by proxies of Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s far-left party La France Insoumise (“France Unbowed”), or LFI, which is, in addition to being a communist front organization, is also France’s “Great Replacement” party. Indeed, Mélenchon, who is running for president in next year’s national election, has been rather explicit in his desire to erase the French people and replace them with foreigners. On a recent panel, echoing remarks from Britain’s Jacob Rees-Mogg on how the English are a “mongrel people,” he derided the very concept of “native French people,” declaring that a “process of creolization has already taken place” in France, and that those wanting a “static world” are dreaming of something that is gone for good.

    No wonder, then, that Mélenchon has publicly supported the unrest, or that LFI politicians have been notably visible during the riots, in some cases appearing at the barricades around schools and urban centers, even as the party has officially denied fomenting violence. Simply put, there is broad crossover between radical-left political activism and pro-Palestinian, Islamist mobilization in France.

But, and this is the point of the article, the author then asserts:

    What is less well known is that mass immigration on this scale doesn’t just destroy a country and a people, it also ushers in forms of authoritarian government that become necessary as a way to manage the problems that arise from a population that includes significant unassimilated ethnic enclaves.

    This is why we now see the political leadership of western countries making hard turns toward authoritarianism, and especially against free speech. Freedom of expression is the one thing you cannot tolerate if the state is going to enforce multiculturalism and impose a large foreign population on a native one. Indeed, managing tensions between disparate ethnic groups, and each group’s relationship to the state, is a hallmark of imperial rule, not republicanism. It’s how the millet system of the Ottoman Empire operated.

He concludes:

    In the end, multiculturalism and authoritarianism are a package deal, and the global leftist leadership of the West is foisting it their native populations. There is only one way to avoid such authoritarianism, and it requires a total rejection of multiculturalism.

    What that means, in concrete terms, is mass deportations, denaturalization, and remigration. Anything less will not be enough to save these countries, assuming it’s not too late already.

•  And on that topic: "Virginia State University gave preferential treatment to Muslim student group while persecuting Christian one, lawsuit alleges"--Daily Mail. 

VIDEO: Massad Ayoob Discusses Why Not Use Your Handloads For Self-Defense

Massad Ayoob has argued for many, many years against using your own handloads for self-defense based on a couple potential problems: (i) a prosecutor or plaintiff's attorney arguing that you specifically manufactured the ammunition to be more deadly; (ii) issues as to powder residue on the target when the distance to the target is a critical issue. The point to using the commercial ammunition is that you can verify or document what was used and be tested. And, if you are really cautious, you may also want to use the same ammunition as the local law enforcement, which makes it even more difficult for a prosecutor to question your choice of ammo. 

 VIDEO: "Cases Where Handloads Caused Court Problems"
Massad Ayoob - Facts and Firearms (22 min.)

Franklin Arms Introduces Multi-Projectile Round For 5.56/.223

From The Firearm Blog: "Franklin Armory Introduces New Multi-projectile Rabbit Rounds Ammo." From the article:

    Franklin Armory, are getting into the ammunition business and its not just a typical 55gr 5.56 round. They’ve launched out the gate with something pretty interesting - Rabbit Rounds. A new multiple-projectile cartridge designed to more effectively harvest smaller game with the ubiquitous AR-15-style modern sporting rifle.

    Franklin Armory’s patent-pending Rabbit Rounds feature four spin-stabilized projectiles, encased in a multi-piece, self-discarding sabot. Rabbit Rounds are available in 5.56x45mm for use with AR-pattern firearms chambered in .223 Remington, .223 Wylde, and 5.56 NATO. The company also plans to bring Rabbit Rounds in additional popular hunting calibers to market soon. ... 

The article appears to be based off a press release, so there is no testing of the ammunition.  Here is a short advertisement video, though, showing it in use:

VIDEO: "Rabbit Rounds™ Make Small Game Hunting Fun Again!"
Franklin Armory (1 min.)

Gun & Prepping News #100

Some links that may be of interest: 

• "Mexico’s Government Funds Gun Grabbing Group"--Battleswarm Blog. Noting that "[t]he organization, Global Action on Gun Violence, has documented connections to Democratic lawmakers. It featured Rep. Dan Goldman in a gun-trafficking discussion⁠ promoted in its May and June 2025 newsletters and endorsed legislation backed by prominent Senate Democrats."
• "Evaluation of Defense Shooting Skills"--The Tactical Wire.  Rich Grassi explains:

    If your only assessment is the state qual course and you do that 1-to-4 times a year, does that really make you qualified? It does check a box, but it’s a minimum standard. The scoring area is vastly larger than it should be, the time you’re allowed is too long and, on the whole, judgement and discretion are never evaluated. 

    So how would a different shooting course help? 

    It’s an attempt to measure basic needed skills with a time constraint as well as allowing the instructor to evaluate gun handling – a critical aspect of the job. 

    The 5x5 classifier can be downloaded as a pdf here. It doesn’t have to be the IDPA 5x5 classifier, that’s just an example. 

• "Practice on the Indoor Range"--The Shooting Wire. The author goes over what he did when he wasn't able to use his regular outdoor range:

    The first trip saw use of the Ruger Mark IV Target; 5.5” bull barrel, metallic sights, the rear adjustable for elevation and windage. The gun has Hogue, Inc. “G-Mascus Green” G10 stocks in place of the factory stocks. Otherwise, there are no modifications.

    The ammunition I selected, based on concerns about indoor ranges and lead ammunition, was CCI CLEAN-22.  While it’s geared more to prevent barrel fouling and making a suppressor easier to clean, I reasoned that it could be a bit more healthy than uncoated lead projectiles. 

    I’m still careful to make use of hand cleaning wipes that are made to remove contamination of this sort. 

    Using a B-8 repair center for each segment, I’d shoot a pair of stages right-handed, replace the target and shoot a pair left-handed. 

    When trying to learn a physical skill like shooting, it’s good to work “mirror image” to get back to being a complete duffer and to iron out bad habits. 

• "The 'Lost' Art of Revolver Reloading"--Guns Magazine. Brent Wheat not only gives detailed instructions on how to do speed reloads for revolvers, but also explains why to use the left hand to hold the revolver when doing so. The article also covers the different between speed reloads (i.e., when speed matters like in combat or competition and using speed loaders), tactical reloads (i.e., removing spent cartridges and replacing them from speed strips or loose rounds), and an administrative reload (when time is not a concern). Explaining why to use the left hand to hold the revolver:

    A revolver cylinder is a floppy thing when it isn’t locked into the frame. On a square range, with your feet planted and your hands working exactly as you command, it’s not much of a problem. But a defensive reload may happen while you’re moving, running, fighting or ‘merely’ trying to keep your balance on a loose, slippery or uneven surface. I can also guarantee you’ll be dealing with an adrenaline dump that might leave your hands shaking like a toy poodle on meth. Now you’ve got to line up a half-dozen fresh cartridges with a cylinder that is moving around at the end of your arm.

     You might be able to get a finger into the cylinder opening to stabilize it — or you might not, because keeping a semblance of a firing grip makes it awkward. Worse, the cylinder could even relatch itself while you’re trying to get everything lined up.

    This is also why the support-side reload was traditionally taught to police officers back in those days when we rode dinosaurs on patrol. It wasn’t because somebody decided it was the fashionable way to reload a revolver; instead, hard-won trial and error proved the technique provided a more stable platform for manipulating the gun under less-than-ideal circumstances.

• "Minimizing Defensive Shotgun Recoil"--Shoot-On.  The tips include (i) using reduced recoil rounds (although the author specifically recommends against using mini-shells); (ii) using a stock that properly fits you and has a recoil pad; (iii) use a gas-operated shotgun; and (iv) adding a recoil reduction system to your stock.
• Going from something with heavy recoil with something quite a bit less: "The Defensive .32 ACP – The Ammo"--The Truth About Guns. A couple tips. First, the author advises avoiding hollow-point ammunition for a couple reasons: (i) if the bullet expands, it will slow it down enough that you lose too much penetration; and (ii) the shorter overall length makes it more likely you will experience "rim lock". Second, he recommends sticking to European ammunition, explaining:

    The American SAAMI standard for .32 ACP specifies a maximum average pressure of 20,500 PSI. The European CIP standard is higher, at roughly 23,200 PSI. That doesn’t mean every European load is automatically hotter, but it does give European manufacturers more room to load the cartridge toward that higher pressure limit.

    If you’re using a European pistol designed for European .32 ACP, it might malfunction with the weaker American stuff. With that said, my various European-designed surplus .32s haven’t had any problems with American-spec .32 ACP from Remington or Aguila.  

    There is another reason I like the European-loaded .32 ACP. It has a much more aggressive bevel near the rim and a deep groove for the extractor. The aggressive bevel acts more like a ramp, helping prevent rimlock and improving extraction. 

• "The Shaw .350 Legend: A Custom AR With a Hometown Touch"--The Truth About Guns. An interesting build for an AR intended for deer hunting, including some product recommendations and using a wood butt stock and pistol grip.  
• "5.11 Tactical Double Pistol Case Review: Protecting Your Investment"--Gat Daily.  The author relates:

    ... It’s designed to carry two handguns along with spare magazines and accessories. The case is 8.75 inches high, 11 inches long, and 3.5 inches deep, which makes it big enough for full sized service pistols. It’s still relatively compact though and would fit inside a patrol bag, ruck or larger range bag. The case is made from 1050D nylon and is fully padded to help protect your firearms during transport.

    Each pistol has its own zippered compartment, and there are three elastic magazine loops on the outside of each compartment. 5.11 uses lockable YKK zippers that open on three sides so the case lays flat on the shooting bench, making it easy to get to your gear. Reinforced grab handles are provided for carry There’s also a name tape panel on the outside, although its a smooth strip so I don’t really know how that works. Maybe write on it with a paint pen? The double pistol case is available in gray or black and has an MSRP of only $40. It’s on sale for $30 on 5.11’s site at the time I’m writing this. 

• "How to Disappear | Modern Escape & Evasion"--Bone Tactical.  He has fifteen (15) rules or tips for disappearing. The first two of these:

    First, assess your situation. Who are you getting away from—and why? Is it an abusive ex, online harassment, a business rebrand, or you just need a hard reset? Rank the threat: capability, reach, motivation, resources, and timeline. If it’s criminal danger, consider involving an attorney and—where appropriate—law enforcement or a victims’ advocate group. If it’s reputational heat, you’re playing a different game. Hopefully you won’t have multiple governments and organized crime after you like I did but stay tuned for the full playbook either way. Step one is to identify the problem before you try to solve it.

    Second, assess your resources and skills. Disappearing means transition, and transitions incur costs. Cash buys time. Skills buy options. Can you work with your hands? Build? Fix? Cook? Drive? Speak another language? The more value you can offer quietly and locally, the less you need to advertise yourself to survive. If money is tight, lean on skills. If skills are thin, learn fast.

He also has some warnings of how people mess this up, including:

Let’s talk about mistakes that get people burned. Breaking routine to chase fun in high-signal places. Oversharing because loneliness bites. Letting anger write checks your freedom can’t cash. Reconnecting with the same crowd that caused the problem. Slipping back into old usernames, old numbers, old patterns. The little compromises add up. Don’t feed the trail. 

• "How Long Can You Store Water? The Ultimate Safety Guide"--SHTF Preparedness. According to the author, "[c]ommercially bottled water, when sealed and kept in a cool, dark place, can remain safe almost indefinitely, while stored tap water is typically recommended to be rotated every 6 to 12 months." But the type of material for the storage container, the environment that the water is stored in, and handling (or mishandling) can effect how long it can be stored. For instance, if a water container is opened, there is always the risk of introducing contaminants which might encourage bacterial or algae growth. 
• "How to Stay Warm Indoors When the Power’s Out (& It’s Freezing Outside)"--More Than Just Surviving. Obviously, if you have alternate methods of heating, you will have an easier time than someone with more limited options. For instance, I have both a large kerosene heater and a carousel fireplace in a relatively small house, so I know from experience that I can keep my home comfortable even in the coldest of weather if, for some reason, the central heating fails. But what if you don't have these advantages? The primary point from the article is forget about trying to heat your entire residence, but instead focus on keeping a small area warm:

    If everybody’s in one room with the door closed and that room has got as many blankets, jackets, coats, pets, and whatever else you have at home to keep y’all as warm as possible, you’re going to have a lot easier of a time trying to stay warm by comparison to trying to heat multiple rooms.

    When it comes to sleeping, you don’t need to share a bed if you don’t want to, but if it’s not something you mind, why not? If you’re not into sharing a bed, drag extra mattresses or sofa cushions into your room of choice and have everyone sleep separately, but by being in the same room, you’re making sure none of your individual bodies’ heat production is going to waste – it’s helping to keep the room warm.

And if you don't have alternative heating methods, the author recommends that you go further and set up a tent in your "warm room" to further make it easier to keep an area warm. He also recommends staying in sub-zero rated sleeping bags and lining your tent with Mylar emergency blankets. He has some other tips, so be sure to read the whole thing. 

• Civilizational collapse: "You Don’t Realize How Far L.A. Has Fallen Until You Come Back"--PJ Media. An excerpt:

    I wrote in January about how, after moving out of L.A., where I lived for the first 30 years of my life, I've been able to see the city's decline more clearly whenever I go back for family visits or appointments every few months. I noted that "just as friends who haven’t seen your kids for a while recognize how much they’ve grown — much more than you, who are with them every day — whenever I drive into Los Angeles once every couple of months, the deterioration of the city is more evident. Many parts truly feel third-world."

    In that article, I focused on L.A.'s homelessness crisis, which can be seen under freeway underpasses, in city parks, and even in reports of homeless people getting into strangers' cars to sleep. This is not only visually disturbing but also anxiety-inducing. You never know how dangerous a homeless person might be, whether high on meth or suffering from severe mental illness. 

[snip]

    Comedian Bridget Phetasy, who recently returned to Los Angeles after years away, described a similar sensation to the one I feel upon returning: "It's like when you see someone and they've, you know, lost a lot of weight and they don't see it because they see themself every day and you see them and you're like, whoa. Right. That's how it feels."

    Phetasy used the word "unsettling" to describe "how much commercial real estate is empty." And she chose as an example a place where I spent many a happy day in both my childhood and young adulthood: Santa Monica's Third Street Promenade. The three pedestrian-only blocks were a favorite destination for so many in the '90s who wanted to catch a movie, grab dinner, shop, or watch street performers. 

    A California Post report earlier this year noted that the Promenade’s vacancy rate is now 25% and that the popularity of the destination began to decline because of the homelessness crisis, then fell further during COVID and the looting inspired by the “Summer of Love” following George Floyd’s death. 

Gun & Prepping News #97

Some links that may be of interest: 

• "Practical Pistol Practice"--Tactical Anatomy Systems. As the author notes, firearms practice is tradeoff between the very real costs of ammunition versus the benefit obtained from a lot of shooting. Therefore, he presents a practice/training regime for the handgun incorporating a mixture of dry fire, using a .22 pistol, and a 50-round practice drill shooting your larger caliber defensive pistol. The author uses dry fire both to practice basic pistol skills between range sessions and as part of his warm up at the range. Then he moves on to the .22 pistol to work on pure pistol skills: grip, stance, sight picture, trigger press, and follow-through, writing: "I like to fire 3 to 5 sets of 10 rounds, slow fire, at 7-10 yards. Each successive target will show a slightly tighter group. Your last target will typically be quite a bit better. At this point, you’re warmed up." Finally, he recommends:

Pick a good 50-round practice drill. A 50-round practice drill every week will benefit you far, far more than a 200-round practice drill once per month. Frequency of training has been proven to be far more effective than total time/ammo spent in training. As for which 50-round drill you should use, there’s a plethora of recommendations out there. This morning, I did a quick googly search for “50-round practice drills” and got pages and pages of recommendations. Pick one, and use it. Most of the time nowadays, when I go to the range I start with my dry fire warmup, then usually a 22 rimfire warmup, then I do one of the many 50-round practice plans that are available online. I’ve used a bunch of different 50-round drills over the years and they all have their strong points, so if you rotate through different ones you’ll find yourself working on more pistol skills than if you stick with a single program. 

• "Homeowner’s Gun Stops Intruder Where the Law Failed"--Shooting News Weekly. Key bit: "The residents woke up to a stranger in their home. The homeowner did the adult thing: he armed himself and when Xavier confronted him, the homeowner changed the intruder’s preferred pronouns to was/were." 
• "Know How: Understanding and Obtaining a Cold-Bore Zero"--American Hunter. Barrel temperature can effect where a bullet strikes. And since you first shot will be from a cold barrel, you need to know where that bullet will land. 
• "Revolver Malfunctions and Stoppages"--Revolver Guy. Revolvers are more dependable than semi-autos in the sense that they are more immune to neglect, poor grip, or poor ammo, but that does not mean that they cannot malfunction. The article covers some of the more common malfunctions and breakages that can occur with a revolver including broken springs, broken firing pins, a broken or worn hand (the part that actually turns the cylinder), worn ratchets, a broken or worn cylinder stop (the part that aligns the cylinder with the barrel), and more. Along the way, he provides information on diagnosing problems, cleaning and lubrication, and other trouble shooting. 
• Some firearm history: "The Hand Cannon: The First Handheld Firearm"--American Rifleman. An excerpt:

One of the more striking details in the segment comes from American Rifleman Executive Editor Evan Brune, who pointed out that many surviving hand cannons share a bore diameter in the .75-to-.78-caliber range—a size established in the 1330s and 1340s that persisted as a near-standard all the way into the early 19th century. That’s roughly 500 years of continuity in a dimension that was arrived at by medieval metalworkers without the benefit of ballistic science. It suggests that the practical limits of what a person can hold and fire were understood early and changed slowly. 

• And some new technology: "The Problem with Pressures: A +Peak Revolution?"--American Hunter. The Peak Alloy cases are a type of steel case that can handle significantly higher pressures than traditional brass cases, but without resorting to hybrid designs such as used by the military for the 6.8 mm. Moreover, assuming you're not trying to use it in an older rifle with inferior metallurgy, it can offer that performance out of existing rifles. However, it is currently only offered for the 7mm Backcountry and 6.5 Creedmoor.

The elevated pressure limits will certainly increase the demands on the rifles receiver, and that was probably a big factor in choosing the popular 6.5 Creedmoor as the first cartridge to receive the +Peak treatment, as the vast majority of rifles so chambered are of relatively new construction, and have the stronger metallurgy associated with the 21st century.  

• "Unrivaled Upgrades: Competition-Bred AR Parts for the Rest of Us"--The Truth About Guns. These do not appear to be competition parts, per se, but parts that were influenced by what Unrivaled learned from making competition parts.
• "PSA JAKL-10 .308 Review – A Modern Battle Rifle?"--Ammo Land. A long stroke pistol design that uses an AR-10 style lower, and a stock similar to the ACR. The author notes:

Good open-tip match-grade ammo would undoubtedly tighten those groups further, but even a 2.25 MOA group isn’t bad at all. I think you could run it as a DMR, but it would probably function best as a battle rifle. This isn’t due to inherent accuracy limitations, but rather to the inherent characteristics of the long-stroke gas piston system, which is where the gun truly excels. 

• "Old (Un)reliable: Finding a Magazine that Works for Your 1911"--American Rifleman. Some advice to a reader that is having issues with certain types of rounds not feeding reliably. Thus, there is a discussion of magazine maintenance and different types of followers for specific types of bullet profiles. 
• "Magpul’s Modified Coyote Brown"--The Truth About Guns.  A new color that is slightly darker than its usual Flat Dark Earth. 
• "IEDs Found in the Carson National Forest"--American Rifleman. A warning that it isn't just aggressive animals that hikers and hunters need to watch out for. The article mentions the destructive devices found in Carson National Forest in New Mexico, the risk of running across pot plantations and meth labs, and that "[o]n July 16, 2026, two female U.S. Forest Service biologists were kidnapped and held hostage on the Shasta-Trinity National Forest." 
•  The return of the pen light: "The Streamlight Wedge SL: EDC Done Right"--The Truth About Guns. This is about the size and shape of a partially used carpenter's pencil, so it carries flat in the pocket. It features three output settings: 50 lumens on Low, 100 lumens on High, and a 500-lumen THRO mode. It is rechargeable. As the author notes, "not every flashlight needs to be tactical. Tactical lights today produce ridiculous amounts of light. That’s great if you’re searching a backyard, clearing a building, or trying to identify someone at a distance. ... [But] [f]or most day-to-day tasks, all of that light can be too much." I carry an old Olight EOS that I have on my key chain for my EDC flashlight--it uses a single AAA and it twists to come on. Not tactical but it does 90% of the things for which I need a flashlight. It would be nice to have something with more throw at times. But I continue with my old, beat up EOS because it is easy to have on me (I almost always have my keys) and not something I'm likely to forget. 
• "Six Days to Anarchy: Silent Weapons for Urban Collapse"--The Truth About Guns.  The author argues for three silenced weapons: a .300 BLK carbine/SBR, a duty pistol, and a .22 pistol. But what caught my attention was the hypothesized cause of collapse:

     Six days.

    That’s the timeline investigative journalist Annie Jacobsen lays out in Biological Warfare: A Scenario for a biological incident to move from outbreak to anarchy and insurrection.

    Not six months. Not six weeks.

    Six days.

    Jacobsen recently discussed that scenario on the Shawn Ryan Show, and one of the more interesting things she brought up wasn’t simply how deadly a biological weapon could be. It’s what happens when fear of infection begins to break down the systems we normally depend on.

     According to Jacobsen, declassified government material repeatedly raises the concern that fear of infection could send the United States spiraling into “anarchy and insurrection.” In the scenario she constructed from her reporting, it takes less than a week to get there.

    Most of us tend to think about preparedness as something with a little runway. You see the storm coming. You watch things getting worse. Then you make a few last-minute runs for food, water, batteries, fuel, medicine, and whatever else you should have bought months ago.
    
    Six days doesn’t give you much of that.

    If something capable of causing that level of disruption ever happened, there probably isn’t going to be time to get your shit together once it starts.

    You either did it beforehand, or you didn’t.

But the fear of the epidemic was the key reason for collapse under the scenario:

     Jacobsen boils a biological threat down to three basic questions: How does it spread? How deadly is it? And is there a medical countermeasure?

    Now imagine nobody has reliable answers.

    People don’t know who is infected. They don’t know exactly how the pathogen spreads. They don’t know whether the information coming from the government is accurate. They don’t know whether there is enough medicine to go around.

    Later in the interview, Jacobsen walks through a scenario involving a limited supply of a perceived medical countermeasure and a population desperate to get it. Law enforcement and first responders face the same exposure risks as everyone else; government resources are stretched thin, and thousands of people are trying to get their hands on something they believe could save their families.

    At that point, you don’t just have a biological emergency.

    You have scared, desperate people competing for limited resources. 

The article links to the video of the interview as well as a video from Garand Thumb on urban collapse and operating in an urban collapse as well as containing more details on his reasoning for each type of silenced weapon, why 6 days is not enough time to prepare, and the importance of keeping a low profile.

• "Retired cop shares inexpensive items everyone should keep in their home to save them from intruders"--Daily Mail. Recommendations to have door braces, door wedge alarms, carrying pepper spray and a personal alarm when walking or jogging, a faraday bag to protect someone copying the signal from your car fob (but also keep the fob near your bed so you can set off the alarm if you have an intruder); as well as a recommending that single women purchase a pair of used, sort of beat up men's work boots, to put outside the door of a house or apartment (remembering to bring them in at times and move them around) to make it look like a man lived in the residence. 

Weekend Reading #71

Some longer or more involved reading:

• Greg Ellifritz has a new Weekend Knowledge Dump at his Active Response Training blog.  Some of the more notable items:
• Greg links to the most recent Range Master newsletter, which itself has several items of interest including the drill of the month, some comments about the importance of institutional memory (i.e., history of techniques), and why 00 buckshot is the best buckshot size for self defense.
• Speaking of institutional memory, Greg notes that over the course of his career, he has "seen how the events encountered in historical police gunfights have completely changed training doctrine and equipment use for both police and armed citizens alike," and indicates that he is going to start a series discussing some of the most important law enforcement shootings and events that changed police training, gear and doctrine. In that vein, he links to an article about the Norco Bank Robbery. 
• Something that we may need to think about is whether to get involved in the defense of a stranger. Greg links to a piece that raises the issue of whether we are best serving our family if we do so.
• A historical article on combat using a Bowie knife. In the 19th Century, there were schools of fencing across the United States that specialized in teaching how to use this weapon.
• A review of Federal Punch in .22 LR as a defensive round. Short take: "But the .22 LR Federal Punch round stands above [other .22 LR rounds] in terms of performance and delivers penetration approaching the levels of .22 Magnum or even .380 ACP."
• Lucky Gunner's testing of ballistics from varying barrel lengths shooting .300 BLK. The testing didn't show much gain from using a longer 16" barrel over the short barrels. Conclusion: "The real advantage of .300 Blackout is flexibility rather than raw ballistics. You get solid performance inside 150 yards, it’s easy to run in a suppressed, short barreled rifle, easy to switch between subsonic and supersonic ammo without changing anything else about the gun, and there’s no shortage of factory loads for either." 

• John Wilder muses about "The Passing Of The American Empire?" First he lays out his case that the United States really does preside over an empire. Then he provides thoughts on whether we are in an empire in decline and where we are at on that path. 
• A long video (41 min.) rather than a read: "How cartel drug smuggling actually works, according to a trafficker"--Business Insider. 
• "Jim Corbett: Eradicator of Man-Eating Tigers & Conservationist"--Shooting Times.  If you like reading about the great dangerous game hunters, you've probably heard of Jim Corbett. If not, Corbett was tasked with hunting man-eating tigers and leopards in colonial India and became a bit of hero. But he also championed preservation of the big cats, with a national park in India named after him. And his caliber of choice was the 7x57mm Mauser (aka, .275 Rigby)--something that would probably be considered underpowered for hunting the big cats in this era. This article give a short biography of his life.  A couple more articles about Corbett:
• "Edward James Corbett - Hunter Turned Conservationist"--Nature Safari India. 
• "Inside Hunter Jim Corbett’s Legendary Showdowns With History’s Scariest Man-Eating Big Cats"--All That Is Interesting. 
• "Inside the disappearance of Hollywood starlet Jean Spangler that saw Kirk Douglas dragged into investigation... after mysterious note bombshell"--Daily Mail. An interesting article if you like true crime stories:

    In Hollywood's golden age, Jean Spangler was just one of countless young starlets dreaming of a fairytale rise to fame.

    With her porcelain doll looks and willowy 5ft8 frame, along with a resume of film bit parts, Spangler seemed destined to make some kind of mark in Tinseltown - even if it was not with her name in lights alongside darlings Betty Grable or Olivia De Havilland. 

    Tragically, the fame Spangler would so desperately seek would not come from her onscreen appearances, but her haunting disappearance in 1949.

    All Spangler left behind was a ripped purse, a mysterious note and a young daughter who never knew why her mother failed to come home. 

    The vanishing of the 26-year-old even saw megastar Kirk Douglas dragged into the fracas.

    Theories swung wildly - from her death during a botched abortion to Spangler leaving LA with gangsters.  

The article also notes that "Spangler disappeared just two years after the heinous murder of Elizabeth Short, who is immortalized in true crime history as the Black Dahlia. Spangler's striking resemblance to Short, combined with her work at Florentine Gardens, owned by Short's acquaintance and murder suspect Mark Hansen, saw police wonder if she was another victim of the killer." Unfortunately, Spangler's case has never been solved and remains open.

Gun & Prepping News #93

Some links that may be of interest: 

• "Fudd Friday: The Brush-Busting Question"--The Firearm Blog. Some information on firearms that do a bit better on penetrating brush based on testing by Francis E. Sell decades ago:

    Sell hunted deer on foot for many years, very successfully, and attacked the brush-busting question as scientifically as possible. He set up tests where he fired at targets behind bushes and measured bullet deflection afterwards.

[snip]

     Sell blasted away with a very wide range of cartridges, trying to determine the optimum bullet weight and shape, as well as velocity. His findings: A velocity between 2,200 and 2,500 fps deflected the least, and was also less likely to have the bullet blow up when hitting a branch or twig. He found that a bullet weight of 150 grains or heavier also made a big difference. He did not note any significant difference between different bullet shapes, and also did not note any difference resulting from bullet diameter—6.5x55 and .270 performed well, along with cartridges using .30-caliber and even .35-caliber bullets. He did, however, note a test where 500-grain .45-70 bullets performed inconsistently in his test, with two bullets “screaming off into the forest” when fired at a target through brush, and then the next two bullets showing no deflection at all.

    Funnily enough, Sell noted that high-velocity, high-performance cartridges fared poorly in his brush-busting experiments. Conversely, the .30-30 performed very well in his test, particularly when loaded with a 170-grain bullet. ... 

• "The .44 Best?"--Guns Magazine. An in depth look at the .44 Special and a good caste bullet and load:

    I cast the bullets for my handloads, usually from an MP-Molds 6-cavity aluminum mold. I started with a brass 2- cavity hollow point (HP) mold, soon progressing to a 4-banger after being so impressed by the quality. When Mihac Previc, owner of MP Molds, offered an aluminum 6-cavity mold, I quickly jumped on board. The molds are a direct copy of Elmer Keith’s Hensley & Gibbs 503. Bullets cast from it usually run 15 grains heavier than Elmer’s other design, the Lyman 429421.

    I’d venture to say my 6-banger has birthed a thousand-plus pounds of lead over the years. My slugs are then powder coated with a polymer coating and baked at 400 degrees for 20 minutes. These PC coated projectiles are then seated over a charge of Alliant Unique powder in a Starline Brass cartridge case.

    Since this isn’t YouTube, I will divulge the powder charge of 7.5 grains of Unique, but most diehards know this. The load is nostalgically referred to as the “Skeeter Load” from the millions of Skeeter fans who know a good thing when they see it. Loved for its balance of power, bullet diameter and acceptable recoiling characteristics, Skeeter Skelton’s popularity and warm writing style did more to promote this load and cartridge than anything. This charge weight provides a fuel-efficient 933 loads per pound of precious Unique powder.

• "Jeff Cooper’s Color Code: You’re Doing it Wrong"--Breach Bang Clear.  The author notes:

    At some point in the 1970s, Jeff Cooper created what is often called the Color Code.

    When he originally thought it up, and as he taught it, his purpose was to describe a shooter’s “…capacity…to cross the psychological barrier that inhibits [the] ability to take deadly action,” i.e., his or her mental preparation to press the trigger on a live target.

However, the Color Code was subsequently reinterpreted (misinterpreted) from describing a psychological commitment to using force to describing a level of situational awareness.

• "How to Read a Room Before You Sit Down"--Option Gray.  An excerpt:

    When you walk into any space, you’re building a quick picture of the environment before you commit to a position in it. This doesn’t require a full tactical assessment. It requires about ten seconds of actual attention before you sit down.

    Exits first. Where are the ways out? The front door is obvious. What’s less obvious is the kitchen exit, the emergency door at the back, the hallway that connects to a side entrance. You don’t need to memorize all of them. You need to know that they exist and roughly where they are.

    Sight lines next. Where can you sit and see the entrance? Seeing who comes through the door before they see you, or before they can close the distance on you, is a meaningful advantage in almost any situation. It costs you nothing to position for it.

    Then the room itself. Who is in it? How many people, where are they seated, is anyone paying unusual attention to entrances or exits? This doesn’t mean treating every stranger as a threat. It means taking a picture of the baseline so that anything that changes later registers as a change. 

There is a lot more, including where to sit.  

• "Magazine Spring Myths"--Guns Magazine.  An excerpt:

Firearm springs wear out because they are repeatedly cycled. Recoil springs, which travel through nearly their full range of motion with every shot, have one of the highest duty cycles in a firearm and are rightly considered routine maintenance items. Magazine springs, by comparison, typically see far fewer complete compression cycles over their lifetime. That’s why a well-made magazine spring can remain fully loaded for decades with little effect, while a recoil spring in a heavily used pistol may legitimately need replacement after several thousand rounds. 

• "Threadlocker How-To // The Glue That Binds Us"--Recoil Magazine.  It goes over how to read thread pitch, why you want to use a torque wrench and not over tighten screws, before getting to the subject of the title and discussing what is Loctite and how it works before getting to application:

    While some of the newer offerings of Loctite offer some oil and solvent resistance, I find that thoroughly degreasing all the threads to be bonded using a strong solvent is an absolute must. My favored method is removing all the screws I needed to coat at once and dipping them in my small steel bench ramekin full of MEK. I let them sit for a few minutes, then remove and blow dry with compressed air. I strongly advise the use of rubber gloves and that this be done in a well-ventilated area. This stuff is super gnarly and will for sure give you face cancer.

    For the most effective bond, the adhesive must coat the complete length of the thread engagement area. Loctite is a thixotropic formula, which means it is thick and viscous under static conditions, and as it spreads along a surface under capillary action, it becomes thinner and will seem almost self-guiding. You’ll find a modest drop on a section of threads will find its way around the circumference and “creep” up and down the helix. When threaded in, this action compounds and the adhesive will work its way up and down the length of the threads quite easily. 

    For large parts, applying to both faces provides the most adequate adhesive application as well as for blind-hole assemblies such as cap screws — threadlocker should be applied to both the bolt and the mating threads. If applied only to the screw going into a blind hole, air pressure tends to force the liquid threadlocker out of the hole as the bolt is torqued down. The anaerobic process hardens in minutes at room temperature and fully cures within 24 hours. 

    When determining the amount to use, it’s important to remember that less is more, and dipping the screw to the head will not make it “more better.” The space between threads allowed by tolerances is actually quite a bit smaller than you think, and the location that the adhesive is applied is much more important than the amount. If you’re trying to determine which level of adhesion fits your specific needs, start on the low end and work your way up gradually and try experimenting a bit if you have the time and resources.

The article also discusses tips on removing screws or bolts secured with Loctite, so read the whole thing.

• "Springfield Armory SA-35 4″ Compact"--The Truth About Guns.  A shorter barrel, no magazine safety, better sights, larger safety levers, improved feed ramp to better feed hollow points, etc.
• "KelTec PR57 Review: How Accurate Is This Top-Loading 5.7 Pistol?"--Ammo Land. This is the 5.7 pistol that was designed for concealed carry. 

    With factory sights and a rest, five five-shot groups at 25 yards averaged 2.65 inches. The groups were plagued with flyers. One four-shot group was 7/8 of an inch. The pistol could shoot better than the aging eyes of the shooter.  The pistol shot about 3 1/2 inches high at 25 yards.

    The Viridian optic was mounted. Five five-shot groups were fired from a rest while sighting in the PR57. At 25 yards, the average group, center to center, was 2.01 inches. Five five-shot groups, fired at 100 yards, averaged 7.6 inches from a rest. There was considerable vertical stringing, which was attributed to an unsatisfactory rest. 23 of the 25 shots fit into a 5 x 8-inch box at 100 yards. The shots were fired deliberately, about a minute per shot.

• "NITECORE NPL25 GL Weapon Light and Green Laser"--The Shooting Wire.  The two main points about this is that (i) it is fairly compact, and (ii) it has a mounting system that allows it to easily adapt to different accessory rails:

    The NPL25 has a sliding plate that can adapt to the rail slot on a wide range of guns. There’s a sprung button on the left side of the light that moves that toothed bar up, releasing the plate. You then slide it to the position you need and release the button to lock it in place. Easy peasy with no plates to hold onto and (inevitably) lose in about 36 hours.

    On a pistol like the FN (above) that has a standard Pic rail, you can a few options as to placement of the sliding plate. On a gun like the G19 (below) with just one slot, it’s easy to adjust and mount it right where you need it. NITECORE ships the NPL25 with a small “Picatinny rail adapter” piece that screws into the two holes you see above, but I mounted the light without a problem without the adapter.

• "10 Essential Skills Every Prepper Needs to Thrive"--prepHERedness. The ten skills (or groupings of skills) discussed in this article are: 

1. Water storage and purification;
2. Food storage and preservation;
3. Cooking from scratch;
4. Medical skills;
5. Making cleaning and sanitation supplies;
6. Basic home repairs;
7. Basic sewing and clothing repair; 
8. Home gardening;
9. Self defense; and,
10.  Using a HAM radio.

And some other articles discussing important skills for prepping:

• "Skills and Knowledge That Make Preppers Resilient and Self-Reliant"--The Provident Prepper.
• "Homesteading Skills Every ‘Prepper’ Must Learn"--Rural Living Today. 
• "Ultimate List of Prepper Skills"--Rogue Preparedness. 
• "Prepper Survival Skills List"--Happy Preppers. 

• "Water Preparedness Starts at Home: Why I Replaced My Berkey with Phoenix Filter Elements"--Apartment Prepper.  The author explains:

I’ve owned a Berkey system for years, and recently I replaced my aging filter elements with the new Phoenix Gravity New Millennium Edition™ filter elements. If you’re a Berkey owner wondering what your replacement options are, here’s why I made the switch and why I think every household should have a plan for safe drinking water.

• "There's One Predator That Terrifies Bears And Mountain Lions Alike"--Science Alert. They are generally much more afraid of you than you are of them. There was recent research out of Africa that similarly showed that the large animals there were more likely to avoid the sound of human voices than even the sound of a lion. 
• "Why UK crime victims’ families always sound so similar talking to the media"--Quotulatiousness. 

    This is incredible. I always wondered how family liaison officers from RICU or the CRS reliably got the families of victims murdered by political or racial terrorists to provide such anodyne, don't look back in anger public statements. I figured in most cases it would be concern trolling, with legal threats held in reserve.

    This lays the technique bare, using interviews conducted both with victim's families and former police officers. Liaison officers serve as anesthetic patches that get slapped on the open wounds of the migration war. They apply therapeutic techniques to calm and reassure the families, establishing dependent relationships and using the trust they build to guide them away from saying anything inflammatory when the time comes to speak to the public. If families become noncompliant in this respect, they're threatened with causing a mistrial should they speak too openly about their feelings.

    That isn't all RICU does, of course. ‘Communications’ includes a huge propaganda arm, which uses every tool at its disposal, including battalions of fake social media profiles. You have to wonder how much of the culture war of the last decade or more was pure hallucination. 

Gun & Prepping News #92

 Some links that may be of interest: 

• "Hero armed citizen opened fire on Idaho In-N-Out gunman, tried to stop shooting that left 2 dead, 7 wounded: harrowing video"--The New York Post.  
• "The Case Against FliteControl" by Travis Pike, The Truth About Guns. The author, who admits to using the 8-pellet Winchester buckshot with the FliteControl wad in his self-defense shotgun, writes:

For me, the biggest argument against FliteControl is the same argument for FliteControl: the pattern is tight. When dealing with typical home defense ranges, every shotgun load is firing a fairly tight pattern due to the limited range. A standard shotgun pattern is tight enough that the likelihood of an errant pellet is quite low.

When we reduce the pattern to a hole slightly larger than a 12-gauge slug, we are losing out on a big benefit to throwing multiple pellets per trigger pull. The little bit of spread we are getting at home defense ranges can help us put pellets where it matters.   

What I believe he is getting at is that you just don't need it for self defense inside the home because the distances are so short.  

• "August 2026 Rangemaster Drill of the Month: 3 Seconds Standard, Vers. 2.0"--The Tactical Wire. Revisiting a point made in the Weekend Reading column:

“The DEA in 2007 had 44 incidents in which shots were fired against criminals. The average engagement distance was 14.6 feet. The typical American sedan is 16 feet long, so we could just say, about a car length. 

“In the case of our students who had to shoot in self-defense, the distances involved were: 

Contact distance 4% 

3-7 yards 91% 

Beyond 7 yards 4%

“The 3 shootings beyond 7 yards were at 15,17 and 22 yards, so some work at that sort of distance is needed, but not a lot. 

“So, we put the vast majority of our effort in class on fast, reliable vital zone hits at the 3,5, and 7 yard lines, with a heavy emphasis on 3-5 yards. Three yards could be classified as conversational distance” and is the zone in which we normally talk to strangers. Five yards is essentially one car length. 7 yards is across a large room. If you think in those terms, the reason 91% of our shootings took place at from 3 to 7 yards makes a lot of sense. Keep this in mind when structuring your practice sessions.” 

• Conversely: "The Long Line – Practice for Precision"--Tactical Wire.  

If you want to be able to shoot at all well at 25 yards, you train at fifty yards. That’s the take from a bullseye shooter – at least one and likely many more. It’s also the take of Pat McNamara, a name familiar to those interested in the tactical/personal protection aspect of firearms. 

• "Civilian Marksmanship Program Announces Sale of M14s"--Bearing Arms. No details on prices or availability. In its announcement, "the CMP revealed that the rifles will be modified to be 'permanently and irreversibly semi-automatic rifles,' and will be 'fully compliant with CMP enabling legislation authorizing the transfer and sale of military surplus .30 caliber rifles.'" My guess--and it is only a guess--is that this means that they will be shipping them with new receivers.
• This looks interesting: Sightmark has released a red dot they are calling the G-Shot. What makes it unique is that the red dot is incorporated into a chassis or frame that is designed to fit over the rear of a standard Gen 3, 4, or 5 Glock slide with no modifications to the slide or need to remove the rear sights. 
• "Deep Concealment: Shedding Light on Pocket Carry"--Athlon Outdoors.  

    While deep concealment is the most common, pocket carry shines in a backup-gun role. Many armed citizens and law enforcement officers have long relied on small revolvers or compact pistols carried in a pocket as a secondary firearm. This provides access to a weapon if the primary gun becomes unavailable or if one hand is occupied. Carrying a backup gun in the support-side pocket can create additional options during a defensive encounter. While not everyone needs a second firearm, pocket carry remains one of the most practical methods for those who choose to carry one.

    For others, pocket carry may simply be the only realistic option. Physical limitations, work attire, body type, or daily activities may make traditional waistband carry difficult. The best carry method is often the one that a person can realistically maintain every day. The key is being honest about your situation. Carrying a smaller firearm in your pocket is far better than leaving a larger firearm at home. However, that decision should be made thoughtfully and not solely for convenience. 

• "Review: .45 Long Colt — History and Ammo Recommendations"--The Mag Life. This is one of only a small number of cartridges that successfully made the transition from black powder to modern smokeless powder. 
• "Marines Just Added AI That Turns M240 Machine Guns Into Drone Killers"--Military.com. A system that automates the tracking and targeting of the drones. 

    According to specs provided to Military.com, the system relies on passive sensing rather than radar, which helps keep the host platform’s signature low. Pointing accuracy is listed at less than one minute of angle.

    In the M240 configuration, the cyclic rate is 850 rounds per minute, and the company has repeatedly highlighted a cost per kill measured in the low tens of dollars, driven largely by the price of the ammunition itself. 

• "Sawyer Mini Not Flowing After Storage? How to Restore It"--Modern Survival Blog. The author explains:

    If your Sawyer Mini barely flows after months or years in storage, do not assume it is worn out. The hollow fibers may need to be fully re-wetted. Sediment or mineral deposits may also be blocking the small passageways.

    The best first step is to run clean water through the filter in the normal direction. Then backflush it forcefully with the included syringe. A stubborn filter may need a warm-water soak or a separate white-vinegar soak.

    This matters for anyone who keeps a water filter in an emergency kit. A filter that worked when stored may seem almost useless when you suddenly need it.

    That is especially true when the kit has never been opened or tested since the day it was purchased.

The remainder of the article provides more detailed directions and explanations.

• "Boot Care: How to properly care for your boots."--Joint Force Tactical.  Instructions on cleaning, drying, water proofing, and conditioning of the boot material. 
• "Best Hand Saw for Cutting Logs and Firewood"--Modern Survival Blog. The "best" is somewhat a misnomer because what is best depends on what is the size of the wood and whether you have someone to help you or are working alone. But he goes over different saws what where they excel. 
• The inevitable result of a natural disaster: "Looting breaks out in Bordeaux's empty suburbs as wildfire inferno so big it makes its own lightning storms moves to just seven miles from city"--Daily Mail.  
• "Parasite outbreak explodes to more than 10,000 cases in one state as hundreds are hospitalized nationwide"--Daily Mail. The state is Michigan, and the parasites discussed in the article are not Somalis but cyclosporiasis, "a sickness that causes diarrhea and stomach pain." 

Gun & Prepping News #91

 Some links that may be of interest: 

• "Violence of Mind & Action: Combat Marksmanship"--Breach Bang Clear. 

    Combat marksmanship (CMMS) is the ability to place lethal precision fire on a threat target in all environments under the stress of combat in order to reduce a threat to a point that it is no longer viable.

    CMMS principles differ from those of marksmanship (MMS) because with the former, an enemy is either actively firing at you or has just been firing at you. In the latter, the Gunfighter has all the time to make a shot count. In CMMS, the Gunfighter has limited time to perceive a threat and then eliminate the threat. That time is literally the rest of their life.  

He goes on to discuss topics of preparedness, mental rehearsal, determination, passion, and speed in order to achieve violence of action:

Violence of action is the execution of actions with surprisingly overwhelming force. It is a culmination of all the passion, determination and speed needed to realize victory. When faced with violence of action the assailant must reevaluate the situation. Violence of action also diminishes the bravado of the assailant and increases the bravery of the Gunfighter. Violence of action is the one aspect that criminals use to surprise victims and totally dominate the situation. By dominating the situation, they control the victim. The Gunfighter must use all the aspects of the combat mindset to be the one that dominates the situation, eliminates any threats with the appropriate level of force and be prepared to go to that level of force.  Thereby controlling the situation and being victorious. 

• "Your Hunting Bullet Choice is Too Small: The Case for a .30 Caliber All-Around Rifle"--Shooting Times. The author's perspective is addressing a single rifle for hunting big game in North America, with his pick being either the .30-06 or .300 Winchester Short Magnum (WSM). He explains:

I recommend that most people wanting to be one-gun hunters focus on .30-caliber cartridges. Those can handle 180-grain to 200-grain bullets for black bears and big nondangerous game like elk and moose, where lighter, smaller-diameter bullets may be less effective.

However, he does recommend larger calibers for dangerous game (e.g., brown bear). 

• Speaking of .30 caliber hunting rifles: "Lightweight AR-10: Building a Hunt-Focused Backcountry Rifle (Part 1)"--American Hunter. The author begins:

AR-10 rifles are a lot of things, but “lightweight” typically isn’t one of them. That is, until the Ruger SFAR was released. But since that rifle is being discontinued, and the guns were somewhat scarce as it is, I thought I’d try my hand at building a lightweight AR-10 and getting it even lighter, if possible. I wanted to stay within a reasonable budget, though. That said, I observed diminishing returns in weight versus cost—it could be lighter by shaving off a few ounces (maybe as much as half a pound depending on the optic you pick), but it would be ridiculously expensive.

The first part focuses on the lower receiver, while the future part 2 will focus on the upper (including optic) and part 3 will cover tuning the rifle. The author used a Nemo Arms receiver set that is made of "billet 7075-T6 aluminum, it’s skeletonized in some places and has lightening cuts in others, minimizing weight." When I built mine, I used a Roam lower receiver made of magnesium which is listed as having a weight of 7.3 ounces. (I also used a Roam upper). 

Related:

• "Is an AR-10 a Good Hunting Rifle?"--Battlbox.  

Quick Answer: Yes, the AR-10 is an excellent hunting rifle. It is most effective for medium to large game like whitetail deer, feral hogs, and elk due to its semi-automatic action and chambering in powerful cartridges like .308 Winchester and 6.5 Creedmoor. 

• "How to Build an AR Hunting Rifle"--Peterson's Hunting.  Some discussion of building an AR-10 for hunting.
• "Building a Lightweight AR-10 on a Budget"--Shooting Illustrated.  

• On the subject of lightweight receivers (albeit for the AR15 platform): "33% Weight Reduction: New 1791 Industries LiteRaider MMC Receivers"--The Firearm Blog. Pricey, but here is the basics:

The weight race for AR platform receivers just shifted, and this is of interest for anyone who’s running & gunning a lot. 1791 Industries is introducing its LiteRaider line of ultra-lightweight uppers and lowers built from Metal Matrix Composite, a material engineered to sit 33 percent lighter than aluminum while matching the strength profile of 7075-T6. That's not a marketing-thin claim; it's built on an actual material science play, one that could reshape how builders approach the sub-eight-pound rifle conversation.

• If you are just looking for a lightweight hunting rifle, it is hard to beat a lightweight bolt action: "Howa Superlite: The Most Affordable Ultralight Hunting Rifle on the Market"--The Truth About Guns. The rifle, sans scope, is only 4.7 lbs. And as to price:

... Most of those ultralight rifles carry price tags north of $2,000, often $3,000 or more, before a scope ever touches the rail. The Howa Superlite in 6.5 Creedmoor breaks that pattern. At a street price that is typically under $1,000, you can easily build a complete rifle-and-optic package that comes in well under the price of other ultralight rifles. After putting rounds downrange from 100 yards out to 750 yards, it’s clear this mountain rifle backs up the affordable price tag with real performance.

• "I Want a Good Defensive Bullpup Shotgun…Is That Too Much to Ask?"--Shooting News Weekly. A quick look at the various bullpup shotguns on the market, including problems or downsides he sees to the different designs. He seems to lean toward the KSG-7 because he believes the extra tubes (and ammunition) just complicate the designs. And although the bullpup shotguns are slower to reload than standard layouts, the author does not believe this is a problem:

But I don’t think most people using a shotgun defensively will ever need to reload. I’ve looked, and I can’t find a single example of a civilian defensive shotgun encounter that required a reload. Even John Correia of ASP hasn’t seen a civilian defensive encounter that required a reload across the entire spectrum of civilian defensive firearms use. 

But, he also adds, "[a]t the end of the day, if having higher capacity and faster reloads is one of your must-haves, a shotgun probably isn’t going to be the weapon you’re going to pick anyway." 

• "KelTec KP50 Review: 100 Rounds of 5.7x28mm in a Compact, Folding Platform"--Guns America.  Another weapon you probably would not need to reload in a defensive context:

 KelTec completely reworked its original P50 concept, replacing the awkward top-loading design with a drop-free magazine, machined receiver and far more practical controls. We put the new KP50 through a high-volume range session, with and without a suppressor, to find out whether the unusual 5.7x28mm pistol is more than a novelty.

The review is very detailed--much more than most firearms reviews. However, the conclusion is:

    The KP50 is not for everyone, and KelTec clearly did not design it to be.

    It is heavier and larger than a conventional handgun. It lacks a last-round bolt hold-open, and its unusual internal arrangement requires the shooter to learn a different manual of arms.

    Ammunition cost will also discourage casual shooters from treating it like a rimfire plinker, no matter how mild the recoil feels. A 50-round box costs us $29, so it’s not ridiculously expensive but also not cheap like 22 LR.

    Within those limitations, however, the KP50 is a remarkably successful redesign.

    The new bottom-loading magazine corrects the original P50’s most awkward feature. The machined construction feels substantial. The folding brace, flat magazine orientation and uninterrupted top rail produce a compact package that is easy to configure and transport. Recoil is almost nonexistent, practical accuracy is excellent and the 9.6-inch barrel produces a meaningful increase in velocity compared with shorter 5.7mm pistols. 

     Most importantly, the KP50 is enjoyable to shoot.

    That may sound like faint praise, but it is not. Firearms do not always need to imitate existing service weapons or satisfy a narrowly defined tactical requirement. There is still room in the market for a well-built, mechanically interesting gun that is accurate, reliable under reasonable conditions, and genuinely fun on the range.

    The KP50 is strange, but it is not strange merely for the sake of attracting attention. Its unusual shape follows an unusual mechanical solution: fitting 50 or 100 rounds of 5.7x28mm into a compact firearm without hanging a large magazine underneath it.

    KelTec took an intriguing but awkward concept and turned it into a much more mature platform. The KP50 remains unmistakably KelTec, but this time the unconventional engineering is paired with unexpectedly good execution.

• "How the Kentucky Rifle Turned Frontier Hunters into America’s First Snipers"--Outdoor Life. A reprint of a 1948 article. An excerpt:

     It was in response to the demands of obstinate frontiersmen that the famous Kentucky model evolved. It hit its stride by about 1730 but underwent steady change for many years. Most rifles were built to the buyer’s specifications or according to the maker’s latest experiments, and the resulting new ideas were eagerly seized upon by competing smiths. For this reason, surviving examples show wide variations in detail. 

    No frontiersman wanted to carry a heavy weapon on his long treks in the wilderness. The weight was steadily reduced until the average Kentucky hunting rifle weighed between 9 and 10 pounds. (Those made for match shooting averaged about 19 pounds.) Similarly, using a large-caliber rifle meant that the lone pioneer had to carry a heavy load of bullets. So the caliber was reduced from the .65 and .70 common in Europe to about .45. The pound of lead that once yielded sixteen .70 bullets now gave forty-eight .45 balls — three times as many shots. 
    
    Simultaneously the front sight was enlarged and the trigger guard strengthened while it was stripped of its old bulk. But probably the most distinctive change came in the barrel, which on previous rifles had been uniformly short and heavy.

    Now it was lengthened, ranging in the early Kentucky models from 51 to 77 inches, or up to more than triple the length of the average big-game rifle of today. This meant that less powder was needed than before, because it burned cleaner. In the opinion of several authorities, this long barrel which gave great accuracy at the same time that it deadened the noise of the firing was the main factor in the success of the Kentucky rifle. 

    Coupled with this was the novel “patch” method of loading invented by some unsung genius. Thanks largely to this discovery, rifles could be reloaded in one fourth the time it took before, and eventually backwoodsmen were getting off their second shot in less than half a minute after the first.  

• "Butterfield Effect Hits ‘The Trace’ Hard as They Try to Reconcile Lower Crime, Higher Gun Ownership"--Shooting News Weekly. It's hard for gun haters and cowards to understand how gun crime can be declining at the same time as gun ownership continues to climb. 
• "Separate outbreak of diarrhea parasite with dozens of cases not related to recalled lettuce identified"--Daily Mail. 

    Health officials are tracking another outbreak of the 'explosive diarrhea' parasite as the disease runs rampant across the US.

    The FDA said 72 people had been infected with cyclosporiasis, a disease transmitted by food or water contaminated with human feces, in a separate cluster than the one with thousands of suspected cases potentially linked to lettuce and Taco Bell. 

• "How to survive the apocalypse, according to the world's best doomsday preppers"--BBC Science Focus. This article is mostly about the booming underground shelter business in the UK and the different survival needs a shelter must address. But there are some tips on storing food and water.
• "Why 20 Million Americans Now Identify as Preppers—and What They’re Buying"--Inc.  The article itself is not significant as it is just another piece on how the underground shelter business is booming--this time focused on the U.S.--but I was somewhat surprised at the statistic of 20 million Americans identifying as preppers, a number that has doubled since 2017 according to the article. 
• Perhaps more realistic for many Americans: "How to prepare for a huge disaster when you live in a tiny apartment"--Vox. An excerpt of an interview with Anna Maria Bounds, a sociology professor at Queens College in New York, and the author of Bracing for the Apocalypse: An Ethnographic Study of New York’s ‘Prepper’ Subculture. (There is a link to the podcast with the full interview). It has some useful advice on storing food and water when living in a small space. For instance, Bounds related:

    ... Another myth about prepping is that people think that that means that you have to have a whole room dedicated to stacks of toilet paper and rice and spaghetti sauce. Absolutely not. You just need to think carefully about how you live in order to learn how to manage your space.

    In the living room in the corner, I had a white freezer, which looked absolutely ridiculous. So I applied wallpaper to it, and I think it looks really cute. The things that I keep in there are varied. I keep several different types of meat. I have some uncooked, and then I have some that are cooked and sliced and that I’ve cooked and ready to go, and I’ve packaged them. We have vegetables, we have pasta, and we have soup. We have pot pies and extra bottles of water because in the event of a blackout, our food will stay colder longer because we have the frozen bottles of water in there. If we get an injury and I need to place something cold on our leg or on our back, we could use that. 

• "CPAP Battery Solutions" (Part 1) (Part 2) -- Blue Collar Prepping. The author discusses her solution for powering her CPAP is the power should go out. Her solution involved the Rockpals Freeman 600 power bank (which can be charged by solar) and some cords so she would power the CPAP using a 12 V output rather than AC. 
•  "How Long Do Firestarters Typically Last?"--Modern Survival Online. This is discussing ferrocerium rods. There are a lot of variables, not the least being the composition and hardness (or softness) of the rod. However, the author states they generally last between 5,000 and 15,000 strikes. However:

    The rule of thumb is that harder alloy compositions last much longer but they don’t produce as many sparks from a typical strike. That’s because less material is physically being consumed.

    Conversely, your softer alloy blends produce a much larger and more intense shower of sparks but they wear out much quicker due to greater consumption.

Test Of Buckshot For Home Defense

 "12 Gauge Buckshot Range Report" by Ben Adams, Appalachian Tactical Academy. A comparison between Federal Tactical 00 8-pellet Buck with Federal’s Flitecontrol wad and Remington Express Tac 12 00 8-pellet Buck, pattern tested at 5, 15, 25, and 35 yards. At 5 yards, the Remington had already opened up a lot more than the Federal, although both patterned within the A-zone on the target. At 15 yards, however, the Remington pattern was significantly larger than the Federal. At 25 yards, the Federal load's pattern was about the size of the Remington's at 15 yards, while the Remington had opened up enough that some pellets were no longer striking on the silhouette. At 35 yards, the Federal was still doing pretty well (1 pellet off the target), but the Remington pattern was so large that it was no longer going to be effective. 35 yards is far beyond any distance you would ever need to shoot in a home defense scenario (unless you lived in a mansion), but could be well short of a property line (or border of your curtilage). Just something to keep in mind. In any event, the author concludes:

    The Federal load I tested is the clear winner over the Remington, but what does that actually mean for you as the end user? Don’t assume that the Federal load is automatically superior for your purposes. A 25+ yard shot just may not be a reality for your individual situation, so why stress about ensuring you have ammo to meet a situation that you are not going to experience?

    Both loads do just fine at distances of 15y and in, which accounts for the longest indoor shot 99% of Americans might have to take. Keep that in mind when choosing a load for your gun. With all that said, my preference is still going to be for the tighter-patterning load, all other things being equal. But what if all other things aren’t equal? Price and availability have to factor into your decision-making process as well.

The latter has certainly played into my selection of shotgun ammo. It was years after I first started hearing about the Federal Flitecontrol 8-pellet buckshot load before I ever came across it in any of the stores in this area, and supply has been very spotty. And when I check online, it seems to always be out of stock or on back order. Consequently,  most of my supply is more standard 00 loadings.