Viewpoints

‘Armageddon Arsenals’ debuted last night on Discovery’s Destination America network. The series explores the weapons and security aspects of the massive new prepping movement, focusing on individuals and families across the country who are preparing for a variety of worst case scenarios–many of them more plausible now than ever.

Black Friday gun sales caused such demand that they caused outages at the FBI background check center. The FBI reported 154,873 background check requests on Friday, November 23 — a 20% increase on last year's record total of 129,166 checks. The requests came in such volume throughout the day that FBI call centers experienced two brief outages — one of 18 minutes and one for 14 minutes — during the busy day, FBI spokesman Stephen Fischer said.

Reader Pearcey knows how to make a danged good revolver. Two readers find S&W oil in quantity. Reader Stone makes a spirited defense of the CM9's simplicity. And, no ‘crazies' here.

The Llama's firing mechanism differs considerably in detail from the 1911. The slide is the main area of interest. For illustration purposes, I chose a rather common Commander-length Llama in 9mm Luger. This pistol is a true compact, however, rather than a short slide on a full-length frame. The extractor is of the external type. There is no extractor tunnel in the slide and no firing-pin stop. While the elimination of the firing-pin stop and internal extractor may seem a good thing, if the treatment is not of high quality, then we have a problem. I've personally never seen a broken firing pin in a Llama pistol, but my friends in the gun-parts business have sold quite a few. On the other hand, I have repaired numerous extractors. The steel seems quite soft and new replacements are not easy to come by (though Gun Parts Corporation and Bob's Gun Shop are places to start looking). I have recut and reshaped these extractors, sometimes convincing the part to last for a time.

John Hayward, writing on the HumanEvents.com blog, said this week, “It never takes long for gun-control fanatics to exploit tragedy for their political ends. NBC’s Bob Costas put on a particularly disgusting and unacceptable display on Sunday night, as he hijacked a football broadcast to sucker-punch fans with a gun-control sermon following the horrible Jovan Belcher murder-suicide.

Jim Axelrod filed a one-sided report on Tuesday's CBS This Morning linking the Jovan Belcher murder-suicide to a lack of gun control inside the NFL. Axelrod sourced the piece with only gun-control advocates – Brady Center flack Marcellus Wiley, NBC's Bob Costas, and New York Times sportswriter William Rhoden.

Governor Patrick Quinn’s procedural maneuver this week to enact a gun ban (previously reported here) was defeated by the Illinois House of Representatives as they convened for a veto session, NRA-ILA reports.

The city attorney of San Bernardino recently told residents to “lock their doors and load their guns” during a city council meeting. The official explained that because the city is bankrupt and slashing public safety budgets, people will need to start protecting themselves, CBSLA.com reports.

Representative George Peterson and Senator Richard Moore will be filing emergency legislation to address the Massachusetts firearm licensing crisis in the next few days, says the Gun Owners' Action League (GOAL) in Massachusetts.

Writing at the American Prospect, Paul Waldman asserts that the NRA had a bad 2012 election season. In fact, he wrote, “they lost almost everywhere they tried to make a difference.”

Got a subscriber note through customer service from Russ Rothman in Florida. He wrote, "I enjoy most of your reports on guns and ammo, and related products, but don't like the Republican Party propaganda. Why don't you report on firearms, and leave the Republican propaganda to the Koch brothers and Karl Rove? The economic, foreign, anti-scientific and mean-spirited policies of the Republican Party are bringing the American people down, and you're helping them. I cannot in good conscience support that."

I have just read Ray Odorica's review of three takedown 22 rifles, including the Browning SA-22. Ray complained about the need to remove the rear sight in order to mount a scope, as well as the exorbitant cost of a scope base and rings for this rifle. Leupold makes a steel barrel mount base (Product #50014), which mounts over the existing iron sights and uses standard dual dovetail steel rings. Both the barrel mount base as well as the rings are solid steel. The total cost of rings and mount from Midway: $46.95. I do not think Ray will find fault in any Leupold product.