Weekend Reading #56

Some longer and more involved reading for the weekend:

•  First up is Greg Ellifritz's Weekend Knowledge Dump. Lots of good stuff this week, but a few that stood out in particular to me:
• Since deescalation is one of the best tools in your self-defense kit when out on the street, I will first mention that Greg has included a link to an article from Skill Set Magazine on deescalation. This article runs through an actual encounter that happened to the author and how it was defused. As the author points out, "humble pie tastes better than jail food." And nods to acknowledging that sometimes the best way to deescalate a situation is to control those who you are with.
• Next one up is "Five Rules To Help You Win A Gunfight!" Just some good practical advice. 
• A piece entitled "My First Safaris" where the author reminisces about hunting trips when he was young. Nothing tactical--nothing really much about hunting, either--but just some good memories. 
• An article on the fastest way to reload a snub nosed revolver (but also applicable to full sized revolvers). The author mentions the standards: a second weapon (the NY reload), speed loaders, speed strips, and then the final which is a variant on the first--having a second weapon, except in this case it being a knife. The author likes the clinch pick.
• A piece entitled "The Lost Intent" which discusses how Cooper's color code had been watered down and changed over time so that it lost is original meaning. (I believe I had linked a similar article not too long ago). Basically, as the author explains:

Cooper was not concerned with whether you were looking around a room. He cared whether you had already made peace with the possibility that you might have to kill someone to survive. His Color Code was a psychological ladder. Each rung brought the mind closer to decisive action, action that most people are deeply unprepared to take.    

It is also the reason that the color code originally went to "black" because red meant you were ready to do some killing but black meant you were doing the killing.

• A nice article and video from Lucky Gunner on the M1 Carbine. 
• A lesson on what is ballistic coefficient and why it is important, including the difference between the G1 and G7 drag models. 
• And while I haven't had a chance to watch it yet, what looks to be an interesting video on the "Principles of the Armed Lifestyle".  

• "Novelty vs. Routine: The One Line Every Man Must Guard Or Watch His Life Slip Away"--Wilder Wealthy & Wise. Some deep thoughts on the difference between living and existing. John notes that "Routine is where life goes to die," but "Chaos is where life goes to lose meaning." Be sure to check it out. 
• "Mystery of sunken Russian ‘ghost ship’ grows after explosions reported while carrying alleged nuclear reactors to North Korea"--The New York Post.  This has to do with the loss of a Russian freighter in December 2024 off the coast of Spain. The article suggests that a Barracuda supercavitating torpedo was used without any explanation about why they think so. The more likely explanation was multiple remote detonated limpet mines with the initial blasts intended to disable the vessel and the remainder detonated after the crew had been rescued in order to sink the vessel. It sank in over 8,200 feet of water so no one will probably ever know. 
• "The Doomsday Organism"--Noema Magazine. The article relates:

    The organism of concern is an artificially created mirror-image form of bacteria, known popularly as mirror life. For decades, biologists have been trying to imitate what, so far, only nature has been able to do: build a living self-replicating cell from scratch. And many believe they are getting closer. But the work to create mirror life, while adjacent to this field, is different, stranger. Mirror life would be the genesis of an organism that does not imitate nature but contradicts it. It would have a molecular structure opposite to that of all existing life on Earth. It would be something completely new under the sun, and its creation would commence the beginning of a second tree of life.

    The road to hell is paved with good intentions. The initial interest in creating mirror biology promised wonderful things: never-before-seen drugs, entirely new biomaterials and profound answers to the origins of life. The U.S. National Science Foundation, the National Natural Science Foundation of China and the European Commission all supported work in this direction. But in recent years, many of the biologists working on its development have come to realize the potential worst-case-scenario consequences of their work. A mirrored organism would be essentially invisible to the immune systems of humans, animals and plants, bypassing the biological defenses that we and other living beings have evolved. Many natural predators, viruses and diseases would be unable to recognize it and therefore powerless to limit its reproduction. As Ariel Lindner, research director of the Systems Engineering and Evolution Dynamics Unit at the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research, or Inserm, told me in an interview: “Living systems know how to deal with invaders, but not with space invaders. Mirror life is a kind of space invader.” 

Such an organism has not been created yet, as far as we know. But the article warns it could happen in the near future.  

History Guy: Man Eating Lions And Tigers And Leopards, Oh My!

This video goes over some historical accounts of man-eaters, mostly in India and Africa, but also touching on accounts from the Americas. Unless you have read the books by Jim Corbett, who professionally hunted man-eaters in India, or read about the lions of Tsavo (or watched the film, The Ghost and the Darkness) you will probably have not heard of most of these incidents. 

The most amazing thing about many of these incidents is how prolific of killers were many of these animals. We're talking about animals (or sometimes a pair working together) that would kill dozens or even hundreds over periods of years. We have nothing comparable in North America from bears or mountain lions. 

Moreover, unless written about by the hunters, we generally have no records of these occurrences, so the actual occurrences was probably much higher. 

VIDEO: "The Leopard of Rudraprayag and Other Man-Eaters"
The History Guy: History Deserves to Be Remembered (18 min.) 

A Nation Of Immigrants: Hacker Twins Delete 96 Gov't Databases

Zero Hedge reports: "Ex-Con Hacker Twins Fired - Proceed To Wipe Out 96 Government Databases In Minutes." 

    February 2025, twin brothers Muneeb and Sohaib Akhter turned a routine job termination into one of the most brazen insider sabotage incidents in recent U.S. government history. Just minutes after being fired from Opexus - a Washington, D.C.-area contractor that provides critical case-management software to more than 45 federal agencies - the brothers allegedly launched a rapid digital assault that deleted approximately 96 government databases containing sensitive FOIA records, investigative files, and taxpayer data.

    What made the case especially shocking was the brothers' prior history: both had served prison time for hacking federal systems a decade earlier. 

David Strom Questions Whether Our Civilization Can Survive Its Elites

In his piece entitled, "Can Our Civilization Survive Its Betrayal By Elites?," David Strom goes discusses how our elites let the barbarians run riot through our streets, attack our women, and then invite more in. He writes (bold added): 

Whatever the excuses for letting criminals run riot, it all boils down to this in liberals' minds: Westerners are the bad guys, and reparations to the oppressed must be made. If you are on the intersectional ladder, you are allowed to do anything until you kill somebody, and even then, you might get a pass.    

This is exactly the point made by the novel The Camp Of The Saints and the express purpose of the decolonization movement. The destruction of our civilization and loss of our lives are the reparations. Strom concludes:

Our society is no longer defending itself from the worst people, and civilizations cannot long survive when the innocent are sacrificed. There will be a breaking point.    

The archeological record is full of peoples and nations that have disappeared. There are also those where only the male lineage has disappeared, where it appears that the invaders killed the men and kept the women. Based on the propaganda, the Left appears to be hoping for the latter. 

Related: "Where Have The Men Gone?"--Zero Hedge. Noting the continued decline in male participation in the work force. "Among all men over 16 years of age, the rate is a devastatingly low 66 percent, so about one-third are gone. Among U.S.-born men, nearly 22 percent are gone."

The Defensive-Only Mindset

I mentioned the other day my belief that the advice to carry as big of a gun as you can conceal generally comes from those who have a background in law enforcement and/or the military who, therefore, come to concealed carry thinking in offensive, rather than defensive, terms. It is a capture or destroy the enemy mindset rather than a stop or escape the enemy. Thus, I was pleased to happen across this article from Concealed Carry entitled "The Defensive-Only Mindset: Why Survival Beats Justice" which articulates the defensive mindset far batter than I could.

    By "defensive-only" the author means "being focused on survival — your own, or the survival of innocent people you're defending — rather than bringing a threat to justice."

    Said differently: a defensive-only person prioritizes the outcome where everyone they care about goes home alive. Anything beyond that is irrelevant. Not the focus or objective or mission.

    That sounds obvious until you watch how often armed citizens drift away from it under pressure. The drift usually shows up in one of two places. Before the fight, where someone escalates a situation they could have walked away from. Or after the fight, where they keep engaging — pursuing, lecturing, or “making sure” — long past the point the threat ended.

    Both of those are failures of mindset, not skill. 

 He explains that most armed citizens spend too much time in the middle of an armed encounter--the drawing and shooting of the weapon--but warns that "[t]he two most common failures don't happen in the middle. They happen at the edges." By this he means the ego trip, monkey dance, or however you want to characterize it that leads up to an unnecessary encounter (e.g., road rage); and trying to act like a cop after an incident. On the latter point, he writes:

Once the threat is neutralized, you have one job: get to a place where you can be safe and contact law enforcement. That's it. Following the bad guy “to keep an eye on him” is not your job. Standing over him and continuing to engage is not your job. Even if it feels like the right thing in the moment, it converts a clean defensive shooting into a mess your attorney is going to spend years trying to unwind. 

He goes on to describe the behaviors of a defensive-only mindset, how to build it, and even gives a detailed real world example of defensive-only mindset, so be sure to read the whole thing. 

Gun Digest: The Ruger LCP MAX With Magpul Enhanced Grip

From Gun Digest: "First Look: Ruger LCP MAX With Magpul Enhanced Grip." As the article notes, "Ruger has just launched a new LCP MAX variant sporting a Magpul Enhanced Handgun Grip." 

    Now sporting a Magpul Enhanced Handgun Grip in Stealth Gray, the new LCP MAX features Magpul’s 3/4-scale TSP texturing on the grip for improved control. It also ships with a flush-fit 10-round mag as well as an extended 13-round magazine with a matching integrated Magpul grip extension. This not only increases your capacity, but it also allows you to get a better grip on the pistol to enhance its shootability. Aesthetically, the slide has also been slightly redesigned to resemble that of the 9mm RXM’s. Despite the change in looks, the slide serrations are still crisp while facilitating a snag-free draw.

    The rest of the LCP MAX Magpul EHG variant is the same as the standard model. That includes its tritium front sight/U-notch rear sight, improved internals and reversible magazine release. It also has both a manual thumb safety and Ruger’s Secure Action fire-control system that uses a bladed-safety trigger.

There isn't much more information, but the article does have better photographs than I've been seeing elsewhere. The grip modules must be interchangeable as Magpul has a page offering them separately in different colors (although they are currently out of stock). Interestingly, though, Magpul states that the modules are "[c]ompatible with all existing LCP MAX models with manual safeties." 

More: "The LCP Meets Magpul: Ruger's LCP Max with Magpul's EHG"--American Rifleman.  

Infrasound Can Cause "Haunted" Feeling

 From SciTechDaily: "That Haunted Feeling May Be Caused by a Sound You Can’t Hear." From the article:

    People exposed to infrasound may not consciously hear it, but they can show higher cortisol levels and increased irritability, which may help explain reports of “haunted” locations.

    Infrasound refers to sound at very low frequencies, below 20 Hertz (Hz), a range that people usually cannot hear. ... In a new study of whether people can sense infrasound, scientists found that although humans do not consciously detect it, their bodies still react, with exposure linked to greater irritability and higher cortisol levels.

    “Infrasound is pervasive in everyday environments, appearing near ventilation systems, traffic, and industrial machinery,” said Prof. Rodney Schmaltz of MacEwan University, senior author of the article in Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience. “Many people are exposed to it without knowing it. Our findings suggest that even a brief exposure may shift mood and raise cortisol, which highlights the importance of understanding how infrasound affects people in real-world settings.

    “Consider visiting a supposedly haunted building. Your mood shifts, you feel agitated, but you can’t see or hear anything unusual. In an old building, there is a good chance that infrasound is present, particularly in basements where aging pipes and ventilation systems produce low-frequency vibrations. If you were told the building was haunted, you might attribute that agitation to something supernatural. In reality, you may simply have been exposed to infrasound.”    

This is not something new. A January 2026 article in the Chinese Journal of Traumatology, entitled "Injury of sonic weapons to human body: A narrative review," relates in regard to infrasonic weapons (footnotes omitted):

    Currently, there are 3 types of sonic weapons: sonic cannons, sonic bullets, and sonic guns, all composed of sonic generators, power devices, and control systems. The Chinese Academy of Sciences has developed a sonic gun with a frequency less than 20 Hz. The SPL of sonic guns developed by the United States (U.S.) and France can reach 160 dB. Infrasonic weapons can be classified into 5 categories based on their generation methods: (1) burst-type: compressed gas, high-pressure steam, or high-pressure gas is released in a pulse to excite the medium and generate sonic waves, with the advantages of small size, low frequency, and easy control, but with low sonic intensity and short range of effect; (2) explosive-type: infrasonic waves are generated by explosions, and about 50% explosive energy converts shockwaves, then decay to produce infrasonic waves; (3) tube-type: its structure and working principle are similar to a flute. Infrasonic waves are generated when the air inside the tube vibrates at the same frequency as the tube itself; (4) speaker-type: the working principle is similar to a speaker. Special diaphragms are used to generate infrasonic waves through vibration; (5) beat frequency-type: 2 sound wave generators with different frequencies are used simultaneously to generate infrasonic waves based on the difference in their frequencies. Compared to intense sound weapons, the development of infrasonic weapons is more challenging, due to the technical difficulties such as it is hard to increase the power output and duration of the infrasonic generator, to reduce the size and weight of the weapon system, to make wave beam more directional and focused.

    The US has secretly used infrasonic weapons in the Somali, the Bosnian, and the Gulf War. It is reported that infrasound attacks on the Bosnian Serb Army caused a large number of soldiers to faint and vomit within seconds, resulting in the loss of combat effectiveness. The US also suspects that its embassy personnel in Havana (Cuba) and Guangzhou (China) have been attacked by infrasonic weapons.  

And, as we now know, U.S. intelligence was actually able to procure such a weapon.  

Report On Hamas' Atrocities

The New York Post has reported on the atrocities that Hamas committed against prisoners both before, during, and after killing them. However, my original post on this was put behind a warning that it involves "sensitive content". Accordingly, I have taken it down. Nevertheless, I will again note that I have no problem believing the reports because it is been a part of how warfare has been carried out historically among primitive tribal peoples and even more advanced cultures that are not Christian. And I will also note that these are the types of people that liberals want to import--and have been importing--into the West. 

U.S. Refuses To Cooperate With U.N.'s Policy Of Replacement Migration

A discussion of the U.S. State Department refusing to cooperate with U.N. efforts to facilitate replacement migration.  As the video notes, it was only a few years ago that discussion of replacement migration was verboten.  

 VIDEO: "It's not a conspiracy anymore.."
Asmongold Clips (4 min.)

Democrat Politician Admits To Being Chinese Agent

From the New York Post: "Democrat Eileen Wang agreed with prosecutors that she worked with the People’s Republic of China to boost propaganda with a fake news website on US soil between 2020 and 2022. She was elected to the city council in Arcadia — a city in the San Gabriel Valley within LA County — in November 2022." I'm sure that she is just one of many.