How an online gun forum keeps journalists honest

or "How M4Carbine.net's members investigated a journalist's sources for him."

  This article was published by the Charlotte, NC Observer newspaper.  The scope of the article focused on gun manufacturer's worries as knee jerk gun control bills are proposed in the wake of the Newtown, CT tragedy.

  In the article, one "manufacturer" was interviewed and a little regurgitation of the news about Cerberus unloading Freedom Group ensued.

  The interview with the "family-owned company near Charlotte is a specialty manufacturer of AR-15’s" was conducted with a Ken Rinkor who is Vice-President of Tactical Arms Manufacturer (the company).

  Mr Rinkor voiced concerns about the company's sole business (AR15 rifles) being outlawed and just happened to mention that he saw "no need" for anyone to have 20-30 round magazines, "even for personal protection."  That statement set the antenna twitching of one "Sensei" at M4Carbine.net.  It's exceedingly odd (and a bit bad for business) when an avowed AR15 manufacturer is personally against "hi capacity" magazines.  Of course, the article claims that they sell "mainly to law enforcement personnel."  WHO?  WHICH DEPARTMENTS?

  Anyway, "Sensei" posted this thread and it was on.  In roughly 24 hours, we (myself included) using freely available sources (Google.com) determined a few interesting facts about Mr. Rinkor and his company Tactical Arms Manufacturing that "sells mainly to law enforcement personnel."

• the company's web site is jarringly poorly done but at least they link to and presumably sell lNC Star's fine line of optics (screenshot)
• the phone number on the web site is a Florida number whereas the fax number is a Massachusetts number
• Better Business Bureau lists the company as a Florida company
• the ATF lists the company as being located in two locations in Orange Park, Florida
• public WHOIS information lists this web site as being registered to Ken Rinkor of Florida, using the same addresses the ATF has on file
• LinkedIn.com lists Ken Rinkor as the IT Director at this company with no military, firearms, nor law enforcement experience
• And......one of the addresses on file is a UPS store .  Interesting how the address of a federal firearms dealer is a UPS store.  

  If you have handled one of these fine rifles from this company, contact me.  If you know of an actual law enforcement professional using one of these rifles, contact me.  If you're a reporter, writing an article; do some research next time and Google Edward R Murrow. Don't do such a poor job that you get called out by folks using Google.

  As for this "company," I don't think it's a real company with real products.  The website and the research above screams FAKE to me (and others).  They do have a Facebook page but aren't accepting comments and deleted negative ones that were made.  A retraction of sorts saying that the company officially does not support bans of high capacity magazines was made and then something along the lines of "if you're really a good shot, you don't need 30 rounds."  

  Good job, mi compadres at M4Carbine.net!  Newspapers, lemme know when you want to hire someone that can do research and speak knowledgeably about firearms.  

TACTICAL ARMS MANUFACTURER INC

XXXX PARK AVE STE XXX ORANGE PARK FL 32073

XXX BLANDING BLVD XXXX ORANGE PARK FL 32073

• 561309XXXXTACTICAL ARMS MANUFACTURER INC

XXXX PARK AVE STE XXX ORANGE PARK FL 32073

XXX BLANDING BLVD XXXX ORANGE PARK FL 32073

561309XXXX

Read more here: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2012/12/18/3734372/gun-makers-fret-as-gun-control.html#storylink=cpy%23storylink=cpy#storylink=cpy

Thoughts on the Connecticut atrocities

  You are more likely to be struck by lightning than to be in a mass shooting.  Yes, literally.  

  We spend more on "fighting terrorism" than we do our highways.  You have roughly a one in twenty million chance of being killed by a terrorist.  You have a one in nineteen thousand chance of being a fatality in a car accident.  However, the budget for Homeland "Defense" is at fifty billion.  The budget for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is around one billion.  Think about that.  

  Amongst the death statistics "caused" by guns in the US, suicides are counted as "murders."   

  In 1927, the deadliest school massacre in US history occurred.  People grieved, and no laws were made, no rights threatened, no knee jerk reactions were mandated into law.  Sometimes terrible things happen.  However, one mother suggests (from painful personal experience) that we do need change of another kind and that would be mental health laws and/or help for parents of children in need.  Read her truly sobering story here.  I note that she doesn't attempt the morally and intellectually bankrupt approach of blaming a knife for her son's aggression.  

  Why can't we have voluntarily armed and formally trained teachers just like our armed airlines pilots program?  

  Myself, I think we could do something to drastically lower our crime and murder rates.  

  We could end the war on drugs.

  

  

  

12/11/12 errata

• Turn in a gun you found in the UK, go to jail

•  Amtrak employees failing drug tests at alarming rates.  Still not profitable but Obama is going forward with high speed rail plans for the US since it worked so well elsewhere.

• Astroturfing in online gun forums is nothing new.  Anderson Manufacturing got busted here 

•  Catfish prey upon truly stupid pigeons

    

Operators, welcome!

  Nope, not a joke.  Have your speakers down (or up) for a video showing a .22 attached to a SCAR.....

  A thought.  The front page shows a guy in Army BDUs.  I've seen countless "tactical" companies hawking their wares with some guy in cammies (usually Army, the Marines are a bit more strict about this sort of thing) and/or the fabled Cooder County SWAT Team.  Respect your own uniform, gents; and don't let people give you a few rounds or free goodies in order to use the uniform to sell their stuff.

  
  

Sometimes being literal catches up with ya

The things they complain about

  are things they could be changin'. 

   So Kris Kristofferson wrote in "To Beat the Devil" but in my opinion, Waylon made this song his own with his rendition of it.  The relevant words from the song are below:

And you still can hear me singin' to the people who don't listen,
To the things that I am sayin', prayin' someone's gonna hear.
And I guess I'll die explaining how the things that they complain about,
Are things they could be changin', hopin' someone's gonna care.

So....what brought on this moment of exasperation?  The AR-15 Dual Trigger.

• The Elftmann Tactical AR-15 Dual Trigger or DTR was inspired by the paintball double trigger
• Increased firing speed
• Enables rapid firing without muzzle lift
• Unique appearance that changes the profile of the AR-15

  There's more at their website.  Including the below which apparently is NOT gun industry inspired satire (added emphasis on the "it's not a joke" part below:

Other products in development include the G-AR or Gun Armor Protection System, which will be released in the first quarter of 2013. The G-AR is designed to protect you and your handgun from a take away attempt and incorporates two razor blades into a billet aluminum base that will easily mount onto your existing tactical rail. 

  Ignoring the low hanging comedy fruit of mounting razor blades to your weapon, I quoted the song in an attempt to link the never ending mantra of "you will get better with training and practice, not gadgets" with the attempt to become a better shot through attaching trash addons like the Dual trigger to your weapons.  Most folks who've had the moment when they realize that they are not the American god of love and war with regards to shooting (usually attained through formal training) also have learned the hard truth you literally cannot buy your way into shooting well.  You must seek formal training and hopefully augment that with competition of some sort if possible and safe.

  However, I'll offer my personal assessment of new gun owners.  I used to tell folks to get a 9mm Glock 19 or 17/M&P9/HK P30 and an AR15.  Mix in training classes, a sling, mags, sights, and ammo. 

  Nowadays, I'm a bit more pessimistic about new gun owners.  Now I recommend a 9mm pistol and a formal training class (beyond the NRA or state CCW classes).  That is it.  Learning how to shoot pistol first makes you a better rifle shot.  Taking a class first allows you to see what gear works.  I don't think the Barackolypse 2.0 is going to ban assault rifles anytime soon; just buy a pistol, ammo, a spare mag or two, and take a formal training class.  A trained shooter who can use their pistol relying upon muscle memory is far better than someone not knowing how to properly shoot and manipulate their rifle and pistol. 

  Be that guy.  Be the one humble enough to learn, smart enough to treat shooting as something to learn.  Shooting is fun, shooting accurately and treating shooting as a martial art to be learned is even more fun.  Also more responsible. 

  I'll close with the song "'cause I don't believe that no one wants to know."

The bad old days

  of firearms journalism made a brief return at Cheaper Than Dirt with the "Babineaux Method" article.  This moronic article purports to enlighten us as to how the "Babineaux Method" of reholstering with your finger inside the trigger guard, behind the trigger is really the safest way of reholstering those new fangled, striker fired Tupperware polymer pistols.  

  This article has been debunked and vilified (rightly so) across the internets.  CTD pulled it from their site after three days.  So, I don't want to nor need to rehash the very obvious arguments against this trash.

  However, it reminded me of the bad old days before the free flow of information afforded to us by the internet and online gun forums.  Gun journalism sucked and for a long time, too.  Folks just couldn't fire up Google and try to find out who the article is referring to when it states (pause for laughter)

"today’s professionals are beginning to utilize a method that has become known as the Babineaux Method."

 By the way, no one has figured out which professionals are doing so nor even who Babineaux is except as the article states:

“Babineaux is a Marine who now works in a major metropolitan law-enforcement agency. He’s been working in a high-risk environment for almost a decade. That environment requires undercover tactics, including deception and deep concealment of a firearm. Because of the sensitive nature of his work, we can’t be more specific about his credentials.”

  See what he did there?  The military knows all excuse coupled with "we could tell you but we'd have to kill you."  The double whammy.  OPSEC.  OPSEC.  OPSEC!  

  So right now, we have a clearly dangerous technique being demonstrated AIWB (Appendix Inside Waist Band) with a clip on, stretchy, crap holster that no on in their right mind would use for anything let alone AIWB.  AIWB works well with holsters that are designed for it.  Holster that retain the firearm, don't stretch, secure solidly to the belt, and position the firearm more vertically instead of letting it flop around.

  The tally:

• unsafe technique
• "we can't tell you what his credentials are.  SECRET.
• someone who clearly does not carry AIWB "demonstrating" the technique

  I would have known this was tripe a few years ago.   I wouldn't have been able to do anything about it and I might have heard through the grapevine about someone thinking it's OK to insert your finger into the trigger guard as you reholster into a soft holster that's not fit for training nor carry.  However, I wouldn't have been able to quickly ascertain "Babineaux the secret squirrel police officer" either doesn't exist or is (probably unless all of this is just really, really bad fiction) a pen name.  I also wouldn't have been able to read or view the author's glowing endorsements of concealed carry pants and just about everything he's given a chance at reviewing.

  And that's when a memory was jogged.  From the bad old days of gun journalism.  An article was written, purporting to be on the need of having rifles with a factory guaranteed level of accuracy.  The author tested only Sako rifles.  The author wore two different Sako hats in the pictures.  The author capped the article with details on his Sako sponsored pronghorn hunt and how his (free rifle too?) Sako performed so well.  That's when I stopped buying gun magazines.  The gun forums are rife with drama, paranoia, and bias but they're nowhere near as bad as the gun magazines.  Print is dying but accountability for the words you write and claim as facts is at an all time high.  Cheaper Than Dirt just realized that, not that I would ever forgive them for price gouging a fifty round box of .45ACP ball all the way up to $60 during the height of the Barackolypse v 1.0 Gun Buying Panic.  It's their right as capitalist to price gouge and publish nonsense.  It's our right to hold them and anyone else accountable for dangerous tripe passed off as an article. 

<admin note:  There are several very good gun writers out there still.  Rob Sloyer and Ed Lawrence come to mind.>