From an opinion piece in The Economist, Apr. 21, 2007:
[The Virginia Tech killer] had two guns: a Glock 9mm and a Walther P22. Both are semi-automatic: they fire bullets as quickly as you can keep pulling the trigger.
Actually, the other dominant form of handgun -- a double-action revolver -- also fires bullets as quickly as you can keep pulling the trigger. The rate of fire from a revolver is, I'm told, slightly less than from a semiautomatic (I take it because in a revolver the trigger pull needs to do more than in a semiautomatic), but only slightly. One can certainly fire a revolver at least once a second with no extra training; it's not a good idea, since one generally won't be accurate with a revolver when firing rapidly, but one generally won't be accurate with a semiautomatic when firing rapidly, either.
Certainly for someone who is shooting at unarmed targets, and thus doesn't have to shoot several times a second -- and apparently the Virginia Tech killer was shooting at a relatively leisurely pace -- the difference between revolver rate of fire and semi-automatic rate of fire is negligible. (The difference in time to reload might be more significant in some situations, though again not in this one.)
Why does this matter? One common argument made by some gun control proponents, expressly or implicitly, is that they're just proposing modest restrictions on just a few guns. After all, it's politically easier to ban something that fewer people own than something that more people own. We're not trying to ban all guns, just so-called "assault weapons." We're not trying to ban all guns, just semiautomatics. We're not trying to ban all guns, just large-capacity magazines. And in the process of making such proposals, they have to explain why this particular kind of gun or magazine is especially deadly.
The trouble is that "assault weapons" aren't really materially deadlier than unbanned non-assault-weapons. Semiautomatic handguns aren't really materially faster-firing than revolvers. Bans on over-10-round magazines will almost never limit criminals, especially the sort of mass killers whom the gun control advocates are discussing. The proposals will do virtually nothing to reduce crime; while I agree that they're not nearly as burdensome to law-abiding citizens as total gun bans would be, they also aren't burdensome to criminals. These modest proposals will fail. And what will gun control advocates propose then?
(More aggressive bans, such as total handgun bans or total gun bans, might actually have more of an effect, both for good and for ill. I think on balance the ill effects will exceed the good ones, but that's a separate matter; at least there's something more than pure symbolism or misunderstanding behind them.)
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Do we really want to go back to a time [before Sam Colt] when skill and natural ability allowed some men to dominate others? I'd rather have the leveling effect of technology myself.
The question then, is this an area where increased enforcement of compliance by the states with federal law would result in increased prevention of these types of gun attacks?
In CA, it is illegal to have a rifle that has a pistol grip and a removable magazine. Thus, you have modified AR-15s with internal (fixed) mags, and other guns with no grips.
CA guns
As to what effect this has on gun deaths? I honestly don't know, but I suspect police would be among those who would agree that 30 rounds of 5.56mm NATO have more potential for harm than 10 rounds of 9mm pistol ammo.
I don't know why anyone would assume that revolvers would be excluded from a legal definition of "semi-automatic." Both fire one round each time the trigger is depressed. When people discuss semi-automatic firearms as something bad and scary, I can never tell what else they think is commonly used. The poster in the other thread was probably right that many ignorant people will think of machine guns. If we use a conceptual definition of semi-automatic and not a technical one, i.e. no reference to ejection of cases, and ban semi-automatics, what's left? Martini-Henry and a double-barrelled shotgun? I would like to know before the next round of laws comes down.
This I find funny as well. Can anyone explain why it is difficult to reload two handguns at once?
I'm just basing this on my own shooting experience.
In general, rifles are more powerful than handguns. More to the point is that so-called "assault weapons" are not more powerful than other types of rifles. Generally, they use a intermediate-power cartridge--for example, the .223/5.56 Nato round that the US military uses is so low-powered that it's illegal for deer hunting in many states (mine included.)
Jerry can fire 5 shotes from his revolver in .6 seconds. That is not a mistype, it is six tenths of one second for five shots.
Jerry can fire 60 shots from his revolver in 20 seconds. That includes ten reloads.
www.shootingusa.com/TV_SCHEDULE/SHOW_24-22/
The political discussion of semi-automatics is just and only that, political. It is a distraction to intelligent discussion and is driven by the agenda of the person who brings it up.
Bad link on the vid.
Which brings up the interesting point: what's so dangerous about someone having an 'arsenal'? OK, if he's ambidextrous he can be twice as dangerous with two pistols but after two, so what?
It never fails to get the authorities and the newsies excited, though.
(Apologies for getting a little OT.)
You must not know very much Mediaese: in this language, a dialect of English commonly found in print, radio, and television, "arsenal" is simply the plural form of "firearm".
-Mr. Language Person (apologies to Dave Barry)
To expand a bit, a semi-auto needs about .10 of a second to cycle the old round out and a new one in. That is an item that a revolver shooter doesn't face. Jerry Miculek can fire six shots-reload-fire six more (all hitting the center of the target, of course) in less than three seconds with a revolver. Jerry is substantially slower when he uses a semi-automatic.
At the 40th percentile level, the lowest level for which I have information, a trained amateur shooter will be able to fire the same 12 rounds from a semi-auto in five seconds at one target without reloads and hit the target about half the time.
At the same proficiency level, a single reload will take about 4.5 seconds. What commentators often miss is that for an amateur every reload will substantially decrease the accuracy of the shots that follow because of the distraction.
In each case, a fully trained shooter, say with 2,000 training rounds and expert instruction, will do the same tasks in one-third the time.
or, paste this: www.shootingusa.com/TV_SCHEDULE/SHOW_24-22/show_24-22.html
LINK
Is one to assume that the police don't know what they're talking about when it comes to revolvers?
He demonstrates a very rapid reload as well.
vs. a Glock - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvwdZ32ZSKA
I agree w/ Bob L., the limiting factor w/ autoloaders is their cycle time, which is independent of the trigger pull. The revolver's cycle is syncronized w/ the trigger pull and so you truly can shoot as fast as you pull the trigger.
He said none of them, including him, could figure out why the shooters with bolt-action rifles did better.
I asked if the competitors were all skilled marksmen. Bruce said yes. Then I pointed out that the bolts of semi-automatic rifles are moving before fired rounds exit the barrels. Bruce did the classic slam of palm into forehead.
Semi-automatic rifles are inherently marginally less accurate than bolt-action rifles for this reason, all other things being equal and, given that all the competitors were very skilled marksmen, that was more important in accuracy than the marginal marksmanship differences between the shooters.
Had the competition been measured as a combination of speed and accuracy shooting (hitting the target the greatest number of times in a given short period), the semi-automatic rifle wielders would have performed relatively better and perhaps won.
You can get more than 30 round magazines for "assault weapons" and you can get 30 round magazines for a handgun.
Also, there are pistol caliber "assault weapons", and rifle caliber handguns.
The categories and dividing lines that not at all as sharply defined as some might believe.
Thanks.
I always discount what is said by politicians and union leaders. They bring unknown agendas to the discussion.
Your point, however, is apples and oranges. I wouldn't want to bring any pistol into conflict with any rifle. (An AR-15, which you cite, is a rifle.) A shootist is always going to want to have any and every advantage known to man, as the stakes are so high.
If I know you're bringing a brick, I want a pistol. If yours is a pistol, I want a rifle. If you've got a rifle, I want a tank, a howitzer and 100 Marines. If you're near the coast, I'll settle for a battleship firing 16 inchers.
Only in an emergency, in a life or death defensive situation, will I pick up a pistol against a pistol. However, the local supermarket got tired of me carrying a shotgun to do my shopping.
It really is that simple.
No, it isn't. Police departments in large numbers are switching from revolvers to semi-automatic handguns.
Apparently, they've compared these two types of weapons, and they seem to believe the latter provide some material advantage.
.38's to semi-autos at least since the venerable .45 model of 1911 came on line. What took them so long?
There are four big reasons that departments are going to semi-automatics:
Modern semi-automatics are simpler to use. In police hands, that means more accurate.
The ability to carry more ammo. This is important to an officer because he/she will be facing unknown circumstances for an unknown time. It is not the number of rounds it buys them, it's the amount of time. Unfortunately for all of us, typical police training is poor and too often (NYC, anyone?) officers adopt the same approach as the gangsta guys: spray and pray. This becomes a good reason for departments to consider going back to revolvers.
Lifecycle cost.
Ego.
The areas that comes closer to addressing your point are the trend to putting more rifles and shotguns in patrol cars, as in Los Angeles and caliber selection and bullet choice. Most departments are moving up into 40 caliber or better and to higher-tech bullets with increased stopping power.
Again, to compare an AR-15 to any pistol is to compare apples and oranges.
Why is that advantage limited to police?
Again, why is that advantage limited to police? Besides, I thought part of Volokh's argument is that you can carry just as much ammo with a revolver - you just have to reload a little more often, which is not material according to him.
But we're not comparing an AR-15 to a pistol. To repeat myself, I'm talking about the fact that police are switching from revolvers to semi-automatic handguns. So we're talking about a comparison of those two weapons.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18246522/
The official IDPA divisions group revolvers as if they are inferior to semiautos. But there was one expert who preferred a double-action Smith &Wesson revolver, and he often outscored the best semiauto users. The IDPA scoring system is based on a combination of speed and accuracy over realistically simulated combat courses.
Her comment: she has known of judges who found that someone was dangerous, yet ordered outpatient treatment. These cases are *extremely* rare, and can only be explained on the ground that a judge can do just about anything without consequences. Anytime a person meets "dangerous to self or others," because of mental illness committment is a logical result. You can't just tell them to walk out the door, even tho you are insane and dangerous, but please do sign up for outpatient therapy.
I think the point EV is making is: To what extent arbitrary distinctions in gun laws actually make anyone safer or decrease the likelihood of criminal activity or increased deaths?
Banning weapons based on looks or the fact that they use composite materials is irrational.
The VT shooter could have legally bought a 30 round magazine for his glock. Are we saying that there is any material difference in carrying three 10 round magazines?
I still don't think they have released how many rounds were fired and how many magazines he had. I would be very surprised if he used anything other than pre-loaded magazines.
Correct. To be precise, the title of the post is "Semi-Automatics Vs. Revolvers".
"But we're not comparing an AR-15 to a pistol. To repeat myself, I'm talking about the fact that police are switching from revolvers to semi-automatic handguns. So we're talking about a comparison of those two weapons."
I certainly hope the police aren't worried about their ability to kill large numbers of unarmed people. What they're worried about is trouble in fire-fights with other well-armed combatants, possible multiple opponents at once.
In a fire-fight, the time it takes to reload is a serious concern; you can get killed very quickly.
Against unarmed opponents, taking a few seconds to reload is not a serious problem, especially if you have a spare weapon to dissuade anyone from rushing you.
Police forces moved from their revolvers to pistols for two main reasons. 1) The pistol cartridges are more powerful than the .38 Special round used in the normal police revolver. 2) A pistol can be reloaded faster than a revolver. There are some other advantages, and some disadvantages too.
"Assault weapons" are military weapons which can fire full automatic. They are not available to the public. The so-called "assault weapons" which the media goes on about are normal semi-automatic weapons, which in some cases are styled after the military ones.
Police departments have had the advantage of comparing
.38's to semi-autos at least since the venerable .45 model of 1911 came on line. What took them so long?
Bureaucracy. Tradition. Caution. A sense of "if it works don't fix it".
Largely due to the methods used by police officers, and the firearms available in mass production.
Most of the changes in police firearms occurred due to reports filed after the 1986 Miami FBI shootout, where two agents were killed and an additional 5 agents and police officers were injured by two (now dead) men. Impressively, one of the robbers only got one shot off -- all of the injuries came from just one of the robbers. The problems there largely arose due to the relatively weak rounds used by the police officers, 9mm and .38 +p spl largely, and the very poor shooting conditions involving a lot of dust, muck, trees, and panic. The following report after that bloody battle noted that the first injury suffered by the shooter would have penetrated his heart if it had gone less than half an inch further, killing him within 30 seconds rather than the 240+ seconds he had. The number of men who had empty revolvers were another issue.
The end result was that larger, more powerful bullets, and more of those bullets, were in demand and at the time, the most cost-effective method for this was a 10mm Federal JHP round, a round designed for semiautomatic pistols, mostly the Delta Elite at that time. This was the 'weakest' round that reliably beat the FBI's tests; note that this doesn't necessarily make it more deadly, at least unless you're in the habit of shooting through 45 degree angled automobile glass. The metrics were later revised and showed a Federal Hydroshok .357 magnum revolver and .45 ACP semiautomatic to also be valid, but only after significant movements were made towards the 10mm. Ironically, the FBI later cut down the powder charge on the bullet rather than deal with the increased recoil and wear that came with this 'proven stopping power', producing the .40 Short and Weak (aka .40 S&W). Both guns resulted in a serious case of keeping up with the Jones, and as a result police officers around the country tended to end up with firearms in these loadings even when such wasn't exactly a good idea. Many police officers have had significant problems thanks to the decreased reliability and increased maintenance requirements involved in semiautomatic handguns. An extra couple of bullets is great, but so is being able to forget about greasing every other part.
In practice, publicly accessible single action and/or double action revolvers have tend to focus on between 4 and 10 chambers in any reasonable cartridge, for economic and size purposes. While there are some revolvers with the capacity for more rounds before needing to be reloaded, these tend to be specialty items and not a valid choice for mass-equipping an entire security force. Semiautomatic pistols typically range at around 10 to 15 rounds per magazine, and the designs make such guns potentially cheaper.
Pistols also tend to be simpler to conceal, thanks to their thinner profile. Usually that's not much of an issue, particularly when things like baggy pants, jackets, vests, or bags and involved, and some potential (patented and prototyped but unsold) linear revolvers could bypass this problem completely if a demand for them ever rose.
The thing is, none of the aspects matter in a case where people are unable to attack back. Assuming a supply of magazines or speedloaders, it takes less than two seconds to reload either a revolver or a pistol, neither of which is enough time to shift the odds further against an opponent who still has a single loaded firearm. Specifically in relation to the thread's topic, there is no meaningful difference in firing rate between a semiautomatic pistol and a double action revolver.
Then by the same logic, wouldn't the other well-armed combatants also want to use semi-automatics?
Again, I don't understand why these are advantages only for the police. Can't the bad guys also benefit from more powerful cartridges and faster reloading?
One curious quote is "Every time he emptied a magazine, he reloaded with skill and speed." I don't think the writer understands how simple it is too reload a semi-automatic pistol; otherwise, he would have realized how dumb this sounds.
Don't the bad guys often end up confronting the police, who are themselves well-armed?
Remember THIS confrontation?
The bad guys already had semi-auto handguns and rifles. They were not produced for the police and then sold to the public.
I don't know why anyone would assume that revolvers would be excluded from a legal definition of "semi-automatic." Both fire one round each time the trigger is depressed. When people discuss semi-automatic firearms as something bad and scary, I can never tell what else they think is commonly used . . .
Oddly enough, there is such a thing as a semi-automatic revolver. Webley made a series of revolvers where the cylinder and the action slid on the frame allowing recoil to advance the cylinder and cock the hammer. Science fiction movie buffs might recognize an example in Zardoz where you can see Sean Connery operate one in the same way one would operate a semi-automatic pistol.
If anything your post reinforces the point that those proposing various firearm restrictions are typically woefully misinformed about the technology and the capabilities.
Mahan Atma:
Why are so many police departments moving away from revolvers if there's no material difference?
I am excluding some reasons already posted.
In the military tests that eventually selected the Colt Model 1911 in .45 ACP, revolvers actually scored lower in reliability. I know that seems counter intuitive but the rotation of the cylinder is accomplished at relatively low torque and is susceptible to easy jamming. A similar issue comes up when comparing traditional lever action rifles to bolt action rifles. The cam action in a bolt action rifle allows extraction of stuck rounds and depending on the design chambering of dented or otherwise damaged ammunition that a lever action rifle can not deal with. To borrow a quote, "When the game is charging with blood in its eye is not the time to be picking grit out of the trigger housing." Reliability is all important in critical situations and the appropriate weapon should be chosen.
Semiautomatic pistols also have a more convenient narrow form factor for carry and generally have lower mass. Despite the lower mass, the operating mechanics buffer the effects of recoil to the extent that some high power rounds can be positively punishing when shot in a revolver without significant training.
I'm afraid I'm not following your point. If its that civilians should not have semi-automatic weapons, well, that's the topic for discussion I guess.
I should point out that it was only the police .38Spl revolvers that were relativly weak. There are many revolvers which are MORE powerful than semi-autos, such as the famous 44 Magnum and the 500 Magnum. These are also sold to the general public. And you could always buy a semi-auto rifle or shotgun, either of which is more lethal than Cho's Glock. I've a feeling this is not what you want to hear though.
Likewise, the difference in reload time is of dubious significance thanks to speedloaders; they are slightly more time-consuming than an expert with a magazine, but an individual speedloader is faster to reload than a magazine and revolvers make up for the speed difference in terms of reliability.
There are several things behind the switch from revolvers to autoloaders by police. One of them is, frankly, fashion driven by salesmanship. Cops are as subject to fads as anyone else, and at the moment autoloaders are fashionable. There's also an element of "keeping up with the Joneses"; when department A gets new weapons, it increases department B's lust for replacements.
Practical reasons also exist. Modern autoloaders are not simpler than wheelieguns, but they're externally simpler, as well as more compact. A large-frame Glock is only about three-quarters of an inch thick, has very few projections to catch on anything, and has its working parts covered by the slide mechanism; other autoloaders are similar. A correspondingly-powerful revolver will be over twice that thick, and is "lumpy"; its mechanism, including the ready rounds, is comparatively exposed. The relatively smooth exterior of the autoloader can make carrying it, holstered or concealed, a bit easier, and there's less mechanism out in the open (probably not a real advantage, but often a perceived one). And a large-caliber revolver is usually heavier.
Autoloaders are also a bit more civilized, especially in the larger calibers. Leakage where the revolver's cylinder meets the barrel can produce a fan of flame, smoke, and partly-burned powder, quite startling to the user; most of that is concealed under the slide of the autoloader. And the relatively massive reciprocating slide mechanism smooths the recoil out -- it doesn't actually reduce recoil, but by spreading it over a few more milliseconds makes the instantaneous "feel" a little more suave than the revolver's. I know I find an M1911-style gun much easier to handle than a revolver of the same caliber.
The larger ammo capacity and (perceived) ease of reloading in action probably don't make any real difference in the utility of the gun, but again it's a matter of fashion as applied to techie nerds -- "Our new guns are '40 caliber and carry fifteen rounds. Makes your .38 sixgun look pretty anemic, no?" Policemen are people. They're as subject to peer pressure and "specmanship" as anybody else.
Regards,
Ric
That sounds like a material difference to me.
That was the rationale given by the FBI, yes. I suspect anyone who has read the incident report will come to a different conclusion. Certainly the 9mm proved to be sufficiently lethal in Cho's hands.
My point is that there must surely be some material advantage to having a semi-automatic handgun versus a revolver, and that such an advantage is likely to benefit bad-guy civilians in many situations as well.
And actually, I'm a strong believer in the Second Amendment (as well as all individual rights), and I don't think semi-automatics should be banned either, but not for the reasons Volokh puts forth above.
Well, in terms of the Virginia Tech killer, no, they don't. Same as Columbine or the Port Arthur massacre or nearly every other spree killing of civilians; they tend to only stop on their own terms while the police sit in the corners and stammer mindlessly. There are exceptions like the Whitman event, but there the police (and civilian deputy) were outgunned and still had little issue taking the asshole down.
If you're trying to bring the thread on an irrelevant tangent about urban city gangbangers, well, that's your choice, but this is neither the time or the place.
Why do people not think of banning the trusty pump 12 guage? Ignorance of guns, I guess.
Why do people not think of banning the trusty pump 12 guage? Ignorance of guns, I guess.
Well there are plenty of examples where they do. Just google "shootout" and "police" if you don't think so.
Really? Seems like very good time and place to me.
I see. Well, each has its pros and cons, and those pros and cons apply regardless of whether the person holding the gun is a good guy or a bad guy. I don't have any numbers off hand but I'm pretty sure that revolvers are used by the bad guys just as often as pistols. If you were to ask me what type of gun to buy for home defence (like thats going to happen) I'd recommend a revolver to you.
As I said earlier, these semi-auto pistols are not police weapons being sold to civilians. If anything the technology flowed in the other direction. Make of that what you will.
Why do people not think of banning the trusty pump 12 guage? Ignorance of guns, I guess.
Given the circumstances, the police officers and FBI agent's accuracy was reasonable (and in a few specific shots, incredible). Tactically they were acceptable if imperfect.
9mm, and .45 ACP, and .50 BMG, and 10mm, and .40 S&W, are all quite lethal. Hell, a .22 LR from a snubby pistol can maim or kill you, although I wouldn't recommend it as a defensive firearm. The problem is that the human body is weak for the matter of long-term survivable, but quite capable of standing quite a lot of damage in the short-term. Short of a shot to the spinal cord or brain, even the most significant damage will allow an average human to continue presenting a fight for ten seconds to several minutes.
Lethality is different than power, and neither is exactly what police officers want in a gun. They want the ability to stop a bad guy, whether that's done by killing or not.
And, yes, personally I'd consider the light .38 special rounds used in the police revolvers at the time to be inadequate for self-defense against an opponent in a vehicle.
I don't consider imperfect tactics to be acceptable, especially where they get people killed.
One officer lost his glasses in the controlled crash and was out of the fight. Two others lost possesion of their weapons and were out of the fight. They knowingly took handguns to a rifle fight. I could go on but I don't want to beat this off topic subject to death. I grieve for those officers and their loved ones, but calling this an ammo failure was grotesque.
Given the circumstances, the police officers and FBI agent's accuracy was reasonable (and in a few specific shots, incredible). Tactically they were acceptable if imperfect.
I do not disagree with you but I think the original poster was questioning the FBI agents' decisions leading up to the gun battle and not their weapons or performance. My own understanding of the incident leads me to see it as a meeting engagement where due consideration of the opposition was not present despite earlier intelligence.
Would more potent firearms have made a difference? Possibly. Would improved operational planning have made a difference? Definitely.
The semi-auto uses the expanding gas energy released from firing the first round to 1)cock the gun and 2)chamber the second round, etc. Subsequent trigger pull just releases the cocked hammer. (Chambering a round means 1)extracting the shell casing of the round just fired from the chamber, 2)ejectng the shell casing of the round just fired, and 3)moving the next round from the magazine where it is stored into the barrel from which it will be fired.)
The double action revolver uses the energy of the shooter's finger to both 1)turn the cylinder to position the bullet under the hammer and in line with the barrel, and 2)cock the gun. The gas energy from the fired round does nothing to either cock the gun or position the next round. The shell casings remain in the cylinder until the shooter removes them by 1)opening the cylinder, and 2)pushing a plunger that forces the casings out.
The semi-auto can therefore be fired with much less trigger pull than the double action revolver.
Also, if you have alot of clips, using reloading an auto is easy. If you have to stop to put bullets into the clip though, its a bigger hassle.
Also, no mag, no fire? I'm no expert but I doubt my Ruger Mark III .22 will fire without a clip in and I try to put a single bullet into it.
I think autos are fine and I'm not above owning one. But I guess I'm a bit old school...I like revolvers. But then I'm one of those black powder freaks so my revolver takes a bit longer to reload.
Interestingly, it apparently was not uncommon for a users of black powder revolvers to carry several loaded cylinders. With a Colt, some could remove the wedge and then the barrel and swap out the cylinder pretty fast.
Hindsight's easy, but I dunno if it is fair in this circumstance.
Remember, this was a very high-priority group of bank robbers, that were already very violent and were expected to really get ugly. The FBI only managed to find their general location thanks to a civilian trailing them after a bank robbery, and finding their exact location was largely luck.
The original plan was to only tail with the lighter armed units until the SWAT-like equipment arrived. It's a fairly sound method, and you still see it done today. However, when one agent saw the robbers pull a mini14 out and put a magazine into it, well, that plan went out the window. The remaining choices were to try following them and risk a rolling gunfight in a civilian area, to let them go, or an unplanned controlled crash. Given that one of these idiots was already suspected of killing a few people, they didn't really have much of a choice.
The FBI agents should have kept their guns holstered during the controlled crash, and probably should have had the. I'm not sure that counts as operational planning, particularly. Maybe they should have had the shotgun in their lap and the kevlar on them, although I'm not sure how long that would have lasted in a ten-hour car patrol, particularly since most of the killing or severely wounding shots went to the extremities or head or were caused by a rifle that it wouldn't have been viable to protect against.
IF the shot that nearly hit Platt's heart went another few inches (as a ++P or larger caliber would have), it's certain two people wouldn't have had time to be killed, and only one would have been injured.
Could the FBI have planned for their trail and call to have failed? Maybe. Maybe not; putting together or ordering in four or five mobile SWAT teams is not exactly a quick action, nor is training for unusual actions like a controlled crash particularly effective.
You should also remember that most police officers, who are not shooting enthusiasts, are not expert marksmen. Most spend full careers without firing their weapon outside the range. Shooting skill requires much more practice than quarterly qualification firing. Add to this that outside of Special Forces, few people train under fire. If you look at the December 2006 Forensic Science News, they report on a study of LEO shootings. Major factors discovered were that the shooters practiced more than the officers, had been in more firefights and expected to be killed so didn't hesitate is opening fire at an opponent, even LEOs.
I suspect that police departments move to the pistol because they are lighter and more compact as well as give the officer more confidence that he has enough trigger pulls. If you know your heart rate is going to be up, your going to be moving and in awkward positions in a firefight, then more pieces of lead are better than fewer heavier pieces.
With some training and a moderate amount of practice, this statement becomes inaccurate. Once a second is plenty of time for accurate shooting. Most qualification standards for police officers require courses of fire at least this fast.
In the last Gunsite course I took, we were all drawing from concealment and firing two shots into the target's center of mass at 3 feet (a realistic self-defense distance) in under 1.5 seconds. As the distance increased so did the time allowed but it never exceeded one second per shot. There was no significant time difference between revolver and pistol shooters unless a reload was required.
I've also heard some reports of policewomen having trouble with jams of selfloaders. The problem seems to be limp-wristing, which will cause some auto mechanisms to fail to cycle properly.
Perhaps my fastest-reloading handgun is a revolver with full-moon clips. 1917 technology.
There is a cost to Professor Volokh's championing of our 2nd amendment freedoms - a lot more Americans are dead as a result. It's simple, it's true, and it takes a straight-talking British conservative magazine to make that point.
I'd choose Gordo's claim that EV has caused the VT massacre.
“I for one value the common sense and lucidity of the Economist's viewpoint…”
Lets consider a few of the purported statements of fact from the Economist.
“Cho killed … of them a Glock 9mm semi-automatic pistol, a rapid-fire weapon…”
The Glock is no more a rapid fire pistol than any other.
“Had powerful guns not been available to him, the deranged Cho would have killed fewer people, and perhaps none at all.”
Suppose Cho had not been able to buy a handgun. He could then have used a sawed-off shotgun concealed in shopping bag with the same or worse result.
“Many of these, especially the suicides, would have happened anyway: but guns make them much easier.”
Even if true, so what? They are just as dead.
“Mr Bush however, has done active damage. On his watch the assault-weapons ban was allowed to lapse in 2004.”
So what. How has that led to a problem?
“No civilian needs an AK-47 for a legitimate purpose, but you can buy one online for $379.99.”
If you look at an actual ad you will see it’s for an AK-47 model WASR, which is a semi-automatic, not a full automatic. The Sturm Ruger Mini-14 was not prohibited by the expired assault weapons ban yet it’s essentially the functional equivalent. Moreover, you cannot buy it online without a federal firearms license; otherwise you must have it delivered to a licensed gun dealer.
A single wound to the torso in the United States is survivable by the vast majority of victims (Cho increased his mortality rate by sheer repetition; going back to shoot his victims again and again... not by using a particularly devastating caliber, or rapid-fire weapons).
Compare our current situation with the 1700's. A torso wound in that era was a virtual death sentence. If the victim didn't bleed to death from a vascular or cardiac injury, infection would eventually set it, particularly with an abdominal wound. Being "gutshot" would be particularly unpleasant, as the resulting perforation of bacteria-filled viscera would rapidly lead to peritonitis and an agonizing death from sepsis. Extremity wounds were sometimes survivable with amputation... but infection killed many of these men as well.
It's safe to say that the authors of the Bill of Rights fully appreciated the lethality of guns, and they'd likely be slack-jawed in amazement at what we're able to do in terms of trauma resuscitation in this day and age.
Cho did not have powerful guns. He had rather weak guns that were 9mm and .22 caliber and were handguns not long guns. A relatively powerful handgun would be a .357 or .45 or .50. A 9mm is about an average "power" handgun, while a .22 is a relatively weak handgun. A rifle or a shotgun is more powerful than just about any handgun and all guns power depends on their barrel length since, if I understand correctly, the longer the barrel the more pressure expanding gas puts on the bullet.
I suspect none of the Economist writers have used guns before. That seems pretty common with a lot of people who call for tighter gun restrictions. They really do not know the difference between various guns, whether technical differences or legal differences. They do know the emotional or aesthetic differences, however, which is what they seem to base much of their reasoning on. So a .22 handgun becomes a powerful gun in their eyes.
I do not shoot very often, but when I do I usually use a friend's .357 Magnum (which is double action) and a Taurus 9mm semi-auto. The firing speed is the same for me for both, but the 9mm can hold more bullets and I can reload it faster. It can also magically turn into an "assault weapon" when I use a 15 bullet magazine instead of a 10 bullet magazine. The .357 never jams, unlike the 9mm, and is more powerful, to the point where it can hurt my hands to fire it depending on what type of ammo I am using. The other disadvantage to the semi-auto is that although you can shoot more bullets if you have preloaded magazines, you have to load the magazines at some point which takes a lot of time and, what I have never seen pointed out before, it can be difficult to completely fill some large capacity magazines. I have never actually bothered to put all 15 rounds into a 15 round magazine because after 13 or so rounds the spring is so tight it becomes more trouble than it is worth to keep trying to force rounds in.
One final note, unlike in the movies it is hard in real life to fire two handguns at once. I tried once just to see what it is like and it very hard to fire both with any speed or accuracy.
The relevant question isn't "can", it is "do".
Note that police have exactly the same reason for using a gun (self-defense) as the rest of us AND have less need for effective self-defense because they're almost never attacked, have backup, etc.
So, if something is appropriate for police, it's clearly appropriate for the rest of us and there may be things that are appropriate for us and not police. It's not the other way around.
That might be true for the average cop on patrol, but there are some instances such as swat teams, riot control, etc. where the police do need more varied and more powerful weapons than the average user. Police do not just use guns for self defense.
2. if you get a lot of magazines and put them on your belt (which this guy at VT did) they are MUCH better than revovlvers..since revovlers dont use magizenes..you have to stop to reload...
Hilarious.
Your proof of this would be ________?
You obviously don't have the requisite knowledge to opine on whether or not what the Economist is saying is "lucid."
But let's get straight to the point. Gun bans in the US, or anywhere else in the world have not saved one life or prevented a single crime. Ever.
And you can produce no fact, evidence, or argument to suggest otherwise.
You are incapable of contributing to this discussion without silly platitudes and false statements.
I thought the primary purpose police have guns is for the defense of the general public, not themselves.
And you can produce no fact, evidence, or argument to suggest otherwise.
Give me a freaking break.
The opposite claim can be made with the exact same certainty. Liberal gun laws have not reduced the crime rate or prevented more crimes than they facilitated. ever. And you can produce no fact, evidence, or argument to suggest otherwise.
The FBI shooting mentioned above filed to mention that the first shot from the FBI severed the bad guy's pulmonary artery. He was dead but still walked around for about 4 minutes shooting. The best FBI shooter lost his glasses and couldn't see.
In a recent police shooting near me the officer fired 15 rounds at a distance of 4 feet and hit the bad buy once. Not exactly a sterling performance for someone not under attack by a firearm at that moment.
There are so many conflicting "privacy issues" now in law that I doubt if any administrator would risk litigation to have anyone declared deranged.
The Brits have created their own little "bubble of vulnerability" by their reaction to gun crime -so have the Aussies. Gun crime against "the public" rose by 200% after the recent confiscation.
Uh, no, I won't:
Would you like to do a crime comparison of US cities with handgun bans vs. those with CC laws?
I don't think so.
LIberal gun laws have not reduced the crime rate or prevented more crimes than they facilitated
Uh, yes they have.
Thanks for participating.
One might think this if one thought the purpose of the police is to prevent crime, rather than apprehend criminals.
Only when you're ignorant or liberal (redundancy alert)
That was in 2002.
Well, shockingly, you thought wrong.
Not to mention the recent shooting in New York where 5 officers fired 50 rounds at two unarmed men in a stopped vehicle and killed 1 of them.
I thought the primary purpose police have guns is for the defense of the general public, not themselves.
Heh.
See comments above.
Then ask yourself how ~550,000 police officers can "defend" 300 million people.
That's the choice of the cop and the police department since the Supreme Court says they have no such obligation.
Since this is obviously a far more important issue than the others raised here, I would have to argue that American usage is incorrect.
A pistol is a class of firearm designed to be held and fired from one hand, having a handgrip but, usually, no shoulder- or butt-stock or fore-end grip. Within this class there are three main species of weapon: the single-shot pistol, the revolver and the self-loading or semi-automatic pistol.
A single comparison between two countries with opposing legislations regarding gun control should be enough to highlight how much gun related deaths correlate with their circulation.
Only to provide a one example here: Canada v. US. As the rate crimes against the person is slightly higher in US than in Canada (3 to 6 times, depending on how you look at the provided figures), the murder rates are comparable between the two countries (still 'only' 5% higher in US). Murder rates committed with rifles compare to those committed other ways (still about 5 times higher in US). But one interesting figure is handguns related murder rates: 15 times higher in US. For the benefit of the readers, there has been a stiff control on handguns in Canada for over 70 years, with an even more tightening grip in the late years. Handgun related casualties (including murder, accidental death ans suicide) also are much higher in US: 14 times higher than Canadian figures.
Since the overall crime rate appears to be just a few times higher in US but the handgun casualties and murders are disproportionately higher than in Canada, we must conclude that the easy access to handguns in US is a great part of the equation, and much more deadly than some people, including EV, seem to believe.
Other factors are obviously to be taken in consideration. But, statistically, increasing handgun ownership is attached to a somewhat similar increase in murder rates and casualties. It is self-evident. Increased power to kill + motive and opportunity to kill = increased chances of a deadly outcome.
A good police department does both: tries to prevent crime and apprehends criminals after the crime. That is partly why police officers patrol the streets and why they have policing strategies instead of just sitting by the phone waiting for people to call 911. Not to mention that one of the main reasons police arrest people for past criminal behavior is to lower the chance of them committing future crimes and to discourage other people who might be tempted to commit crimes.
I have been reading up on Giulinai's terms as mayor both through the book Prince of the City and in his book Leadership. Both talk about the major change of thinking in the NYPD during the 90's first through broken windows policing which tried to stop minor crimes on the theory that stopping minor crimes prevents major crimes. For instance when they started arresting people for for turnstyle jumping, they found that about 1 out of 7 of these people had outstanding warrants, concealed weapons, etc.. The second major change was CompStat, which was a computer statitics tracking sytem that recorded where and what crimes were occuring on a daily basis and which showed police where they needed to focus there efforts to police crime. These were two of the major factors that many people (especially the ones directly involved with the policing efforts like Bratton and Giuliani) credit with the dramatic 90's drop in crime in New York. If a police department does not think that one of its goals is to prevent crime whenever reasonably possible, it is in need of a mission overhaul.
No that is not nearly enough. Why pick Canada and the US? Why not Switzerland and Great Britain? Switzerland has a much higher percentage of firearm circulation than in Great Britain, but there is a higher rate of firearm related crime in Great Briatin. And you can also compare states and cities within the US where in DC and Chicago handguns are banned, but they have high handgun crime rates, while states like North Dokata handguns are legal, but you have a low handgun realted crime rate.
Demographics are key and I suspect that if you switched the laws of Canada with the laws of the US, but kept the same populations the crime rates of the populations would not change much. About half of all murderers and about half of all murder victims in the US are black, even though blacks make up only about 10% of our population. Why gun crime happens is much too complex an issue to boil down to "lets just compare two countries laws".
I don't know why the decision is consistently mischaracterized. The Supreme Court said the police don't have a responsibility to protect specific individuals and they are not liable for failure to do so.
You suggested that switching american and canadian gun control policies could have no significant effect on crime rates. Please note I never challenged such an idea (I don't clearly know why you focused on that issue). I simply pointed out that, with similar (or statistically close) crime rates and non-handgun related murder rates, two different environments are likely to experience different body counts provided that more handguns are available in one than the other. This is the key point of my argumentation.
Ethnic and economic clash, among demographic differences, may have a lot to do with crime rates, but my guess is that granting small criminals access to weapons doesn't necessarily make them more or less criminals, but it makes them more likely to be deadly. I'm sure we can agree on that ground.
OK. How is it being mischaracterized? We are all specific individuals.
If you were to actually compare the numbers with some actual adjusts for those confounding values -- for example, showing correlations adjusted for race, ethnicity, and setting, and only marking about homicides or dead people rather than both at the same time -- you'd find that the numbers start to vastly swing closer to the favor of Americans.
As for small criminals having access to weapons making them deadly, well, outside of somehow managing to effectively ban rifles, shotguns, and ice picks (rough lethality equal to or greater than handgun rounds), criminals are going to have weapons. Hell, you'd probably need to cut off everyone's hands to really make a world without weapons : it takes very little pressure to kill a human being.
“… but my guess is that granting small criminals access to weapons …”
How do you propose to keep weapons from criminals? By definition a criminal is someone willing to break the law. As such he can get weapons as easily as he can get illegal drugs and counterfeit identification. It’s illegal to have a phony drivers license. But in LA you can get one for about $300 quite easily. If you have big bucks, you can even get a US passport. A real one printed by the government with your picture and phony name. The criminals would love it if all weapons were confiscated from the general law abiding population. Then they could prey on unarmed citizenry at will. Interviews with criminals verify that they are afraid of armed citizens. They prefer to burgle homes while the owners are out because they know full well that they might get shot.
It’s time to come down from the clouds of abstraction and face real life.
As you can see, it appears that lax gun laws or tight ones have very little to do with crime rates. In fact the city with the lowest murder rate, Honolulu, is in the state with by far the strictest statewide gun control laws. And Chicago, with its draconian gun laws has a lower crime rate than Dallas, Houston, and Nashville, each of them full of pistol packin' he men. Of course, New York just pisses you gun advocates off, doesn't it? Don't worry, you still have D.C., although even it managed to come in behind St. Louis, another manly gun totin' city.
You need a magazine loader. They run about $5.00, and they make it easy to load a magazine fully.
As for jamming, my Glock autoloader has never misfired, while my Taurus revolver is prone to cylinder jams, perhaps because I use cheap ammo in it. Revolvers were once thought to be more reliable than autoloaders, but modern manufacturing has pretty much eliminated the difference, except maybe for 1911s (which I don't shoot, but I've heard a lot of stories). Autoloaders are a lot easier to clean, too: no need to clean out all the chambers in the cylinder.
How do they account for the much greater drop in crime rates in NYC and Chicago during the same period when they did not change their gun laws at all? Shouldn't they have acted as a control and cast doubt on Lott's conclusions?
A fast-burning, fairly light powder charge and a JHP bullet will be more likely to misfeed than a medium-burning and more powerful charge with a FMJ or wadcutter. Conversion kits have major issues, as well as do cheaper gun makers, and no matter how good the gun is it can still misfeed without proper maintenance or if you limp-wrist it. And, of course, some individual guns have problems with specific ammo or circumstances : get a speck of dirt near a Ruger 22/45 and you'll misfeed any hollowpoint, AR-15s and their clones hate weak ammo.
The thing about revolvers is that there are no real minor failures that can cripple you. Even if a round squibs, you just pull the bang switch again. That's easy, and fairly instinctive. Semiautomatics, however, you have to manually cycle the action on a squib, misfeed, stovepipe, anything of that nature. It's not particularly hard, and should be fairly instinctive... but most people don't practice with snap caps like they should. There are a good many examples of police officers with a single bad round turning their handgun into a lump of metal because they simply couldn't recognize the problem and clear the chamber fast enough.
Is toting a gun manly? If so, why?
Don't believe the stories. The 1911 is an extremely sound and reliable design, and like most autoloaders it will function with only minimal care. There's a reason Old Slabsides has been around so long. If you want to read the opinion of someone who would actually know this (as opposed to gun magazine naysayers, shooting range knowitalls, or internet commenters like me), check out H.W. McBride's "A Rifleman Went to War." His discussion of the difference between revolvers and autoloaders, and the utility of Old Slabsides, is a classic.
absolute complete rubbish
i am a police officer, AND a firearms instructor. i fully support concealed carry, and i see NO evidence that police benefit from ANY restriction in firearms.
i have personally had a friend shot and killed. the suspect was a convicted felon. he was ALREADY breaking the law. no law or gun restriction would have helped this.
i have had another friend who is ONLY alive because an armed citizen (with a CCW) protected him.
regardless, what REALLY pisses me off is when people quote so called "spokesmen" for the police such as the IACP (International Association of Chiefs of Police) or some kind of union head as representative of COPS in general.
i have worked for 3 different agencies and have spoken to dozens of cops on this subject, and OVERWHELMINGLY - real cops ie street cops support concealed carry and do not believe that we benefit from increased restrictions on firearms.
personally, i can carry on college campuses (i'm exempt from the law). it doesn't follow that i don't want ALL lawfully carrying citizens to have the same RIGHT as i do.
we do NOT benefit from "any restrictions on firearms". imo, we benefit when people are allowed to lawfully carry concealed, like in my state and others.
so please do not speak for people you don't know, or know about.
You can’t really understand crime rates with without reference to race. White crime rates are relatively constant and low. If you just look at white crime, then the US looks like the EU (with a few exceptions like Scotland) with all the guns we have. The changes in homicide rates are largely driven by changes in black and Hispanic demographics and incarceration. You can get data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics Source Book here, which also provides the racial composition of inmates. The white crime rates are actually less than indicated because Hispanics are combined with whites. But if you look at incarceration rates, where Hispanics are broken out, you can see the difference. Most atempts to analyze the relation between guns and crime fail to consider this important confounding variable.
I think at least the NYPD would disagree with you.
i only know a few cops from NYPD but i know cops all over the nation, and overall - LINE COPS (ie people who are not political appointees and have a connection to the street) support concealed carry
the president of the IACP (or the NYCPD police commissioner) 's opinion has exactly zero relevance to the opinion of actual cops
Absolutely. I heard that from Oakland cops years ago. My old Oakland neighborhood got short-changed when it came to police protection. We ended up hiring our own private patrol car. Off-the-record in a candid conversation the police said: “we can’t protect you, get a gun.” No one with any sense takes what comes out of the mouths of big city mayors, police chiefs, of the heads of organizations like the Police Foundation, seriously.
You have to assume, then, that the two countries are in all other ways alike. This is highly unlikely, and in the case of Canada vs U.S., very clearly not the case.
For example, if you remove the "contribution" of young urban black and hispanic males to U.S. homicide rates, the resulting rates are very close to the same, if not quite identical.
Again, if you compare the homicide rates of Canadian provinces with their adjacent U.S. states, with two exceptions (New York is one, I think Michigan is the other) the adjacent states have lower rates than their Canadian neighbors. (And after looking at which states border the provinces, it isn't because they have strict gun control.)
Unfortunately, the Economist and other British and even US news media know very little about firearms and it shows.
What do they call someone who has strong opinions about something they know nothing about?
Bush administration political appointee? =)
I was going to guess "A reporter".
Why only gun legislation? Since we're talking about crime, why not bring general criminal legislation into the picture as well? Japan, for example, in addition to a low crime rate also has the death penalty. Strangely enough advocates of Japanese style gun legislation seemingly never want to adopt Japanese style death penalty legislation, or other characteristics of Japanese law enforcement--such as a nationalized police force and prisons which can charitably be described as "draconian". From what I recall, there is also no such thing as trial by jury.
I carry a Colt Python and it has never ever jammed. It has no safety and is always ready to fire. In my opinion anyone who truly faces a sudden need to defend his life should use a wheel gun.
However, the underlying ideas behind both suggestions deserve more consideration. A priori both the idea that an armed populace generally deters crime and the idea that weapons that are harder to use at a high rate of speed should be banned are plausible. Technically, they aren't even incompatible. One could easily believe that if people had two shot pistols it would greatly deter offensive violence while not minimizing the possibility these arms could be used to kill many people.
Sure the semi-automatic ban is a bad idea but I know people here complain when someone dismisses the media's simplified notion of a conservative/libertarian notion so we should be charitable with what they do with liberal ideas as well. In particular a more plausible proposal is to require all handguns to be double action revolvers (if this isn't technically correct I mean a handgun which requires bullets to be loaded individually and to be cocked before firing).
Now I personally think this might actually be a fairly good idea but it's entirely possible that the number of shootings involving more than 6 bullets fire by one person is so small that it isn't worth the inconvenience to gun enthusiasts. It could even be that using a slower weapon would encourage amateurs to aim more making them more deadly. So I would want more data before I was ready to have a clear opinion.
On the other hand I think banning assault rifles would be a violation of the 2nd amendment (yes I think banning handguns would be fine but not assault rifles..personal defense is not the point).
If you have read thru the comments you should know that a revolver could be reloaded almost as fast as a semi-automatic pistol with the use of a simple jig. You would need some kind of radically redesigned revolver that would require the shooter to individually load the bullets. I don’t understand this obsession with rapid fire. As far as I can see it’s a non-problem.
(yes I think banning handguns would be fine but not assault rifles..personal defense is not the point).
Personal defense is the major issue for most people, not being part of some kind of irregular militia. A large number of people have guns as insurance against personal assault and that’s the extent of their interest.
The contrast between the rate of criminal violence in
the United States and that in Canada is much more dramatic
(figure 12). Over the past decade, the Canadian
rate of violent crime has increased while, in the United
States during the same time period, the rate of violent
crime has slid from 600 per 100,000 to 500 per 100,000
(Gannon 2001).17
Table 1: An international comparison of the use of guns in violent crime
Violent Crime Homicide Robbery Suicide Accidents
United States (2001) 26% 63% 42% 56% 1%
Canada (2001) 3% 31% 14% 20% <1%
Australia (2001) 1% [est.] 14% 6% 12% NA
England/Wales (00/01) 1% [est.] 9% 4% 2% NA
The Gold Standard of Gun Control
Americans see less crime than Britons, Canadians
CANADA'S GUN REGISTRATION FAILURE: VIOLENT CRIME RATE DOUBLE THAT OF U.S.
As some of you are no doubt aware, a semi-auto full-frame high-capacity 9mm occupies more hand than the typical male has available (ie. you can't close your fingers around the grip). I'm not sure about the .22 but I would imagine not much finger is left over there either. This means neither hand can be used to reload the opposite hand's empty gun.
Therefore, the each gun must be parked in order to free that hand to reload the other hand's empty gun with its preloaded magazine. Then the procedure would be reversed. I envision two hip or leg holsters for parking and front mounted, opposite side-entrance magazine storage.
Finally, the 10-shot .22 vs the 15-shot 9mm presents all kinds of curious reload sequences assuming the shooter wanted a known overall reload sequencing.
So what gives?
I spent a fair amount of time talking with cops about the change in the law here, during the years before and after we had carry reform. To a man -- and a woman -- before the law passed all of them were very interested in the details of the statewide computerized database of permit holders; they all were very sure that they'd want to know, before they went up to a car that they'd stopped, if the driver had a carry permit.
Since then, I've talked with several cops who do traffic stops. With the exception of the one whose department requires that he check out the carry permit status of the owner of the car that he stops, not one of them routinely bothers to, anymore.
(About 1% of the total population in Minnesota has carry permits; as a practical matter, this means that a cop who does a lot of traffic stops will frequently be stopping a permit holder -- the percentage is going to be higher among drivers, and there's no particular reason to think that permit holders are more or less likely to be engaged in moderate speeding, having broken tail lights, etc.)
Yep, he sure has been scrupulous in responding to criticism. He has even posed as a woman to post positive comments about his book on Amazon.com and sued people for defamation who dispute his conclusions. As for his original research on which he bases his conclusions. Well, the dog ate his hard drives.
BTW, his "research" doesn't even prove the first half of the title of his book. Nowhere does he show that concealed carry laws result in more guns being either on the streets (concealed on the bodies of law-abiding citizens) or even increase the rate of gun ownership. So his entire thesis is bogus.
Actually, I cited two. And actually it does since his statistical model would have to account for why the crime rate dropped even in those jurisdictions that did not adopt concealed carry (and sometimes at much greater rates). It utterly fails to do this.
also, i don't think cops opinions are all over the map on concealed carry (not in my experience in 4 different states).
at least among the scores i have talked to, the VAST majority support concealed carry for citizens
.
as for glocks jamming... glocks are prone to one type of problem - and that is stovepiping. it is usually USER ERROR, caused by "limp wristing". the glock needs a stable platform to recoil against. i see this most often when shooters are practicing one handed shooting, for obvious reasons.
it also does nto amaze me (but saddens me) :) that there are so many OPINIONs about revolvers, semi-autos, etc. that are completely uninformed to say the least, as many have pointed out. how about before one forms an opinion, one first looks at facts?
Someone who has a bad habit of limp wristing could easily find a revolver more reliable.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limp_wristing
williak:
Has anyone provided an analysis of the shooter's reloading sequence? As far as I know, the shooter was reported to be shooting with both semis at the same time. This mode of shooting presents some significant issues wrt reloading.
I tried it with my Browning Challenger .22 and a large frame Glock. The only difficulty I had was retrieving loaded magazines and pulling the slide of the Glock completely rearward which I found impossible using only my finger tips and thumb. If you rely on only the Glock slide release to get back into battery, it seems possible. The whole operation was ungainly enough that I would preferentially holster the second pistol. Without detailed witness statements, I suspect Cho did exactly that during reloads. Reloading my Challenger .22 was similar in difficulty so maybe my hands are large enough to make a single test meaningless.
I am not completely clear how my Challenger compares to the Walther P22. I suspect the Walther is slightly smaller in the grip area.
K Parker:
Logic:
On the other hand I think banning assault rifles would be a violation of the 2nd amendment (yes I think banning handguns would be fine...
Until our military stops issuing handguns, would such a ban fail the Miller test?
I have always found the argument that the 2nd amendment only protects the type of arms used by the army and select militia unconvincing. Why would members of the militia have the same requirements? The firearms you have immediately available and are familiar with are better then the ones that are unavailable or unsuitable.
Out of curiosity, how do courts treat prior decisions like Miller where only one side was represented?
Sure. And in some states, it's legally required (for those of us carrying lawfully; for those who are carrying unlawfully, it's self-incrimination).
I think it's a tossup, myself -- other than when it's legally required. In some cases, one will run into a cop who has strong opinions about non-cops carrying, that he or she will be more than happy to share, at great length. (And there was the time that I volunteered that I was carrying to a couple of Minneapolis cops who didn't know how to handle a situation in which they had to give a gun back to somebody; much hilarity ensued.) All in all, I advise folks to simply not bring the subject up -- unless it's either legally required or the cop is going to see the gun anyway (it's best, in that sort of situation, that it not be a surprise). After all, one isn't pulled over because one is lawfully carrying a firearm; it's irrelevant to the issue of the traffic stop.
safety is paramount. tell the cop you are carrying . he will appreciate the courtesy (might get you OUT of a ticket ) :) and there will be much less chance of some sort of situation where he draws down on you cause he happens to see the gun inadvertently. whether or not that would be legally justifiable, etc. it is much more likely to happen if you don't tell him, and he sees it inadvertently.
I've been carrying -- lawfully, with a carry permit -- for some years, now, and I've got the concealment thing down pretty well; the chances of a cop seeing the gun inadvertently are negligible, unless he or she asks me to get out of the car, in which case we're going to have a short discussion, first ("Sure, officer -- but before I do, you should know that I've got my carry permit in my left hip pocket, and I'm carrying today; it's in my right pants pocket. What would you like me to do?").
If I knew, in advance, that I was dealing with a good, service-oriented officer who wasn't interested in hassling a permit holder, I'd be perfectly willing to routinely mention the permit and the firearm. But I don't* -- and while the odds are that I am, I'd just rather not get involved in a break-even-or-lose situation, and not bring the subject up unless I think it's necessary.
_______________
* And, in fact, one relatively local cop I know of one of whose hobbies has been hassling permit holders comes off, at first blush, as being a fairly decent, professional sort of guy.
if somebody hassled me for carrying, i'd just call one of you lawyer guys and sue him for violating my civil rights :)
The most serious challenge to his work was a study that restricted county populations to 100,000 inhabitants and over, and low and behold, that and a different statistical technique came up with data consistent with your two examples. Its clear from your comments you havent read the book; only on-line critiques from googling. If you want to have a serious discussion, start with the second edition and not some trite banalities gleaned from google.
Finally, it is the nature of scientific research that his work has been published, and it has been critiqued; further work continues to be done to refine the problem. Bottom line is this: he did a study which suggests crime and gun restrictions are inversely correlated; some subsequent studies have replicated his work, and a some have not. You originally asked for an example, and I provided one. I made no assertions about its "correctness." Too early in the research process for that determination.
The only part of his research that he 'lost' was a telephone survey. The rest of his statistical analysis is available on his web site in the format of the statistical program he uses.
He further responded to some of the criticism in his book The Bias Against Guns. I've also said before (perhaps not here) that he appears to be oversensitive to criticism of his research. Taking on an internet persona to defend his own work was extremely poor form, but does not invalidate his work, it merely shows some personality flaws. I would like to note that in early US history, it was common for people to respond to criticism in newspapers under a pseudonym. See the Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers for examples.
This is true only of single-action and DA/SA semi-automatics. This is not true for double-action semi-automatics or Glocks. With DA pistols and glocks, the firing mechanism is cocked by the trigger pull.
But that is how they use handguns. You will not see SWAT teams breaching doors, nor riot troops marshalling with pistols. They will have long arms. People who use guns for serious work consider handguns to be defensive weapons (with narrow exceptions).