Some Firearms/Self-Defense Articles You Might Have Missed

• "ATF Shifting Goalposts Again on Firearm Receivers"--AmmoLand. Basically, the ATF now considers any unfinished polymer receiver to be a "receiver" under federal law. The article reports that a new ATF letter to manufacturers claims that, "with regard to 'unfinished receivers' for striker-fired handguns, they consider these 'partially completed receivers' to be 'readily convertible' into functional receivers, and therefore they must be treated exactly the same as completed receivers." 
• More: "Statement from Polymer80 Regarding Recent ATF Letter"--AmmoLand. Polymer80 will comply with the new ATF requirements but will be taking steps to challenge the new ATF policy on legal grounds. The company also urges people to buy its products to support it in its fight against the ATF. 
• "Shipping Your Rifle Just Got A Little Harder To Do"--Shooting Illustrated. And, for once, it isn't the government that is making things harder. As the author notes, UPS and Fed Ex have their own requirements for shipping a firearm above and beyond what is required by the law, which are discussed by this article.
• "Trying the Cheek Pistol With the Recover Tactical P-IX"--The Mag Life. Owners of AR pistols have long used the buffer tube as a cheek rest, but it seems over the past couple of years that it has caught on with those shooting semi-auto pistols without buffer tubes and with shotguns using birdsheads grips (e.g., the Shockwave or Tac13). According to this author, the bufferless large format pistols now fall within a category he terms a "cheek pistol". 

What’s a cheek pistol?

    The idea Rhett came up with is fairly simple. You need some form of large format pistol that lacks a slide or has the slide hidden. There is no stock or brace required, and it only really works with larger handguns. One of the more common and affordable is the CP-33, which I’ve seen used more than others. Other candidates include the B&T MP9 and maybe even certain models of the Masterpiece Arms MAC-style pistols.

    A cheek pistol requires an optic, and that optic should sit nice and high on the gun. I’m talking AR rifle height, and a nice tall mount works well. Your cheek should rest on the pistol, and you should be able to see through the optic fairly easily. Your support hand should wrap around the top of the handguard, (or—well, front of the pistol), in front of the optic. This combination of the optic requirement, cheek, and hand placement really limits the number of firearms that can be cheek pistols.

    The idea behind the gun and the cheek pistol concept is pretty simple. It’s a very supported position, and the cheek weld is much like that on a standard rifle. The purpose is simple, and it allows you to extend the effective range of handguns to almost rifle-like ranges. Well, maybe SMG-like ranges. The idea is you can reach out to 100 yards with a handgun.

• "First Look: Safariland Chest Rig"--Gun Digest. I've really like my Gunfighters Inc. Kenai Chest Holster because it is lightweight, comfortable, and I can purchase additional Kydex holsters to use with it without having to purchase a new or different chest harness. Safariland has stepped up and come out with a similar product, except that it works with its 6000 and 7TS series holsters. So if you already have one or more holsters of those styles, you can install those on the harness system. The MSRP is $99 (although I presume this is sans holster) and it is currently only offered in a right-hand configuration.
• "The Truth About Shotgun Slugs"--Shooting Illustrated. A basic overview of different slugs and options, as well as limitations. Although not mentioned in the article, I would note that the U.S. Forest Service recommends deep penetrating Brenneke slugs for bear defense.
• "The (Almost) Perfect Rattlesnake Gun"--Guns Magazine. The author hunts rattlesnakes and uses their skins to make belts, knife sheaths, etc. He wants something that will kill the snakes without undue damage to the skins and so he uses a .22 shot cartridge. Because he often finds the snakes close together, he also wants a repeater of some sort. Unfortunately, the shot cartridges will not cycle a semi-auto handgun, so he has turned to revolvers. His preference would be a 12-shot revolver, but, as he describes, he is making due with a Pietta 1873 10-shot .22 revolver.

Benchmade Push Dagger

• "Punch Daggers for CCW: An Underrated Tool?"--Guns America Digest. He goes over the advantages to a punch dagger (aka push dagger):

    First, due to the T-shaped handle and how you grip it, a punch dagger packs a lot of blade length in not much overall package. If a normally fixed blade has a handle length of 5 inches or so, a punch dagger has about 2. Especially for horizontal carry, that is a huge savings. A punch dagger also knew from inception that it wasn’t going to have the blade length to reach anything vital i.e. you aren’t going to hit the heart or other deep organ with a stab. So most of them compensate by having a wide blade, which makes a large (if surface) wound channel. Knife wounds need to make a hole for blood to fall out of, it’s how it works. Your options are deep or wide, and at least a punch dagger knows which one it prefers.

    Second, a punch dagger is instinctive to use. Probably part of why “punch” is in its name. While you can slash with one, it feels a bit odd. It was designed to protrude from your hand and then….punch things. If you can throw a jab or a cross, you already have the training you need to make one effective. And the T shape comes into play again. Most stabbing implements require a guard to keep your hand from sliding onto the blade if you hit something hard like a bone or a brick wall. Not every shot is going to land. A punch dagger gets around this by filling your fist in a manner that makes slipping over the blade near impossible.

The punch dagger featured in his article is the Dragonfly from RMJ Tactical, but he notes that Cold Steel offers one for about half the price. The link he has for the knife is dead and it does not appear that the Dragonfly knife is currently offered by the RMJ Tactical. The link to Cold Steel takes you to the page for their Safe Maker II knife which has an MSRP of $54.99. I have a Benchmade 175BK CBK Push Dagger, but it also appears to be discontinued, although I found a couple sites where it is still listed for sale. 

    An alternative, which Greg Ellifritz has recommended, is the KaBar TDI, which is $46.97 at Amazon.

• "Defense Or Deceased? Carrying A Knife Might Get You Killed" by Steve Tarani, Guns Magazine. Tarani argues that if you intend on using a knife for self-defense, even as an adjacent to a firearm, that you need to get trained in its use or you will die! For instance, he states: "Much like the gun, without formal training in edged-weapon self-defense, a knife carrier has a very high likelihood of having no success at all using it in a defense capacity." He then spends much of the article going over why you cannot possibly use a knife for self-defense if not trained, and that you are practically guaranteed to die if you get into a fight where both parties are armed. ("Since before written history in the Philippines, a knife fight was considered a death sentence for both combatants."). Consequently, he writes:

I strongly recommend finding a competent instructor or martial arts school. It is incumbent upon a new knife owner to learn at least the functionality of utilizing an edged weapon in self-defense, such as knife safety, access, carry, rapid deployment and operation.

He adds:

You don’t need to be a blade master by any means, but at least attend a knife-defense workshop, or seminar or find a valid Filipino Martial Arts (FMA) school or instructor to learn the basics. Much like a firearm, learning how to fight with a knife (not knife fighting!) includes fundamentals such as grip, stability, positions, balance and movement.

A fencing or HEMA class will teach most of the same thing. Anyway, I think the foregoing is why knives which use mimics something you may already know, such as throwing a punch, are probably preferable to a standard knife for most people wanting to carry a knife as an auxiliary weapon.   

•  "Appeals Court Strikes Down Bump Stock Ban in 13-3 Decision"--Breitbart. The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, in an en banc decision, struck down the Trump Administration's ban on bump stocks ruling that a bump stock did not meet the statutory requirement for an automatic weapon (the firing more than one shot each time the trigger was depressed).