This is astounding.

Yesterday, SB-1164 in Texas passed:

By a 20-11 vote, a divided Texas Senate gave final approval this morning to a bill that would allow college students with state handgun licenses to carry weapons in dorms and classrooms.

And get a load of the headline and lede at GunFreeKids.org:

Texas Senators Who Voted to Force Hidden and Loaded Guns Onto College Campuses Put Students’ Lives at Greater Risk of Gun Violence

(Austin, TX, May 20, 2009) – Today the Texas state senate passed dangerous legislation that would force the carrying of hidden and concealed guns at public universities and colleges.

Force.

You can’t make this stuff up. (via Uncle)

A while back I posted on the story of pizza shop owner John Hayes, who shot and killed an armed robber.

Recently a follow-up story ran which includes:

The pizza shop owner defended his life and his cash, but business has since suffered. It’s down 80 percent.

“We’ve slowed down. We lost a lot of our core customers in the neighborhood,” Hayes said.

I noted at the time that a neighborhood resident noted that it was the first time that “something of this nature” had happened in the area, and that he must have meant someone defending themselves against armed robbery, because that very pizza shop had been successfully robbed at least three times in the past two years.

Pizza shop gets robbed three times in two years? No problem.

Pizza shop owner shoots robber on the fourth time? To scary to eat there.

Pathetic.

The blue hippos on the insert are the icing on the cake.

Oops. Don’t forget the spare mag in your carry-on.

That’s a bummer, but I’m glad it ended well enough.

Too stupid for words.

New scope will improve SAW gunners’ range

Marine Times:

The Corps will purchase more than 10,500 SAW Day Optics, or nearly one for every SAW in the Corps’ inventory, Arthaud said. Officials signed a $33 million contract with Trijicon, of Wixom, Mich., on April 30, and plan to field the device beginning early in 2010 as quantities become available, said Karl Solomon, optics team lead for SysCom’s optics and nonlethal systems program.

This is the first time the weapon will have its own designated optic. The Corps’ Rifle Combat Optic — often known as the Advanced Combat Optic Gunsight — has been used with the SAW in some environments, but the SDO has been adapted specifically to handle the SAW’s larger recoil and will eventually reach virtually every infantry squad.

Part of Trijicon’s ACOG family, the SDO will have 3.5x magnification and slightly longer eye relief to compensate for the SAW’s recoil. The SDO is also going to work with the upcoming IAR, which the Marines will use to replace some SAWs.

The Army apparently isn’t interested in the SDO. Big Green uses the M145 machine gun optic which is also compatible with the M240B.

Adam Heggenstaller’s got pics and info.

The T48 Automatic Rifle

Happened across this great page on the T48. I had no idea that Harrington & Richardson was involved in this program. Wow.

Go look.

The Soundboard: “Do try this at home” Edition

RNS points out a brilliant idea: using pool cue chalk as a reactive target:

Billiards chalk is 7/8 of an inch per side and even when hit with something as slow moving as a standard velocity 22LR out of a pistol, makes a bigger poof than Charles Nelson Riley.

If you can hit it.

I found cheap chalk ($12.95 for 144 pieces) on Amazon and just placed an order.

And then there’s this:

Some of the people at the range will tell you that you won’t be able to hit them. Some of them will actually get amusement from telling you so repeatedly. Even when you hit your first one, they’ll call it luck. After you start hitting them in strings, those same people will then tell you about how they could probably do that with an SKS.

LOL.

Murdoc’s no statistician, but he’s thinking the answer is “no.”

From the NSSF:

Up over 30% over last April

I would suspect that private sales of long guns (which usually don’t require NICS checks) could also be up as buyers unable to find what they want in shops are buying from gun owners who need cash in these tough times.