Comments on: “Big Boomers” and “Vest Busters”

By: Joel Rosenberg

Joel Rosenberg — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 15:27:55 +0000

Well, of course. A gun that is inexpensive is a “Saturday night special”; be kind of a shame if people without much money could afford to own a handgun. A rifle that is inaccurate is a “junk gun” or an “assault weapon”; if it can take a magazine that holds more than ten rounds, it is a “bullet hose”. An accurate rifle — say, one with better than 1 MOA accuracy, like my own Winchester Model 70 — is a “sniper rifle.”

Gotta get with the program.

By: Mark Draughn

Mark Draughn — Sun, 21 Dec 2008 21:38:30 +0000

I’d missed the AWB connection to pocket rockets too. The professional anti-gun crowd is one of the worst examples of getting people to hate things they don’t understand. Unfortunately, it’s a divide-and-conquer approach that works: Assault weapons, Saturday-night specials, pocket rockets, cop-killers, sniper rifles…if they can pick this up again during the next few years, they’ll probably eventually want to close the “hunting rifle” loophole…

By: Joel Rosenberg

Joel Rosenberg — Sun, 21 Dec 2008 20:25:36 +0000

I’m not as negative about .44 mag as you are. I think it’s a legitimate home/self-defense choice, with a very careful selection of ammo. (By no particulr coincidence…)

There was a time when I could have argued that the ability to practice with .44 special loads made it a better choice, but, by and large, .44spl ammo is more expensive, these days.

I don’t find .44 Magnum stuff fun to shoot, though. .50AE, though, is fun — much easier to handle the recoil, although not the drain on the bank account.

Glad I could connect the dots for you about the AWB and the pocket rockets; it’s one of my favorite unintended consequences.

By: Michael

Michael — Sun, 21 Dec 2008 20:16:55 +0000

Awesome article. I hadn’t really drawn the connection between the AWB and “pocket rockets.”

And the .500 mag as an offensive hand gun? The only scenario it would work in is if someone broke in to your house and it was the only gun available to defend yourself with.

Seriously, I think the .500 mag and the .50 AE are going to go the way of the .44 mag. Fun to shoot, and can always impress whenever you talk about it. But useless for any practical purposes. Initially expensive and then as the round goes further and further to the way side, the round becomes even more expensive, fewer people use it, the round is pushed more to the way side, so on and so forth.