Range Note

The tourists were gone and the locals hard at work, leaving the range empty yesterday. Daughter, son-in-law and old man took advantage and monopolized the 25-yard range for a couple of hours, shooting the SS Colt 1911 and some of the guns that don't see enough use.

Dave favored the Winchester '94 but  did his best work with the 1911 -- one group just under four inches with one in the x-ring, making for a near tie between spouses.  I decline the honor of referring the  point about who shot better.

Then there was the BL22, a rifle I like a lot and one I would nominate for a  high place in the list of best-machined lever-actions ever. We didn't get compulsive about measuring the Browning's groups, just ran 60 or 70 rounds through it Chuck Conners style, fast and offhand.

My personal satisfaction peaked with the three-screw SA .22. You may recall me grousing here about the shoddy Ruger work and non-existent customer service installing the "safety" conversion. The home-brew fix  worked fine. My only regret is forgetting to bring the Stetson to round out the six-shooter and Buscadero rig. Next time.

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For what it is worth, these two young folks are not totally unknown as players in the MSM, and you can safely bet that they won't let some cop or Brady-ite  get away with calling a 10-22 an assault rifle in their pages.

Not everyone can be lucky enough to raise a weapons-aware news kid, but you can always invite one  to go shooting with you.

Range Kids

A well-known news editor hones her management style.

With the de-lawyered  SS Colt  Series 70 and his father-in-law's  hand loads, a chief photographer explains to senior management  why the photo should go above the fold.

Similar persuasive device is the carbine version. Orginally conceived as a tool for annoying hoplopobes by its very existence, it does't shoot all that badly.

A closer photo would better show braggability.The young lady hasn't shot a rifled weapon  in years. Five shots were scattered over four inches at 25 yards, with one centered in the X ring.

Terror Bear

Found in  trash can at the public range yesterday. He lives here now.

We call him Ursama bin Laden.

War on Drugs, as if we needed further proof

In the San Francisco Tenderloin district, cops and drug thugs are demonstrating the degree to which  the War on Drugs  has been lost.  The city has conceded defeat and settles for a short cease-fire  every week-day morning and afternoon.

Along the route children take to a Catholic school, there is a stepped-up police patrol. Officers  shoo away the ubiquitous street dealers so the children aren't exposed to them.  When they're locked safely in the school, the cops drift off, and  Flydaddy  returns to vend his bags of  white powder. It's hard to think of a better example of the futility of  enforcing laws which are primarily unrealistic words on paper.


Decriminalizing narcotics for adults would have  its own nightmare problems of administration, enforcement and education,  but what could possibly be worse than a message to drug dealers that, yeah, you've won; we ask, however,  that you take your coffee breaks  while the  wee ones are walking to school. Then you can go ahead with your felonies, and we probably won't get around to annoying you too much.

One of the facts  we mention too seldom is the price of drugs.  The pharmaceutical cost of  cocaine and heroin is something like 2 per cent of its illegal -- street -- cost. The other 98 per cent is a government  contribution to the  net worth and cash flow of drug czars and their serfs.

That 2 per cent estimate is from an old William F. Buckley statement, as is his report that more Americans die from drug-war violence than from the use  of the drugs themselves.