Q4 2013 update

I am a horrible blogger.  Mental note, need to post up far more often...

Just a couple updates.

All of the financial documents have been filed with the State of Missouri and several manufacturers and distributors of VERY good equipment have a copy of our license.  Many have some decent initial buy-ins, typically $500.

First order as a company was placed with Ace Cases (www.acecase.com) who are purveyers of VERY nice bags and holsters.  It was a fund raiser for the Liberal Gun Club (www.theliberalgunclub.org) and $90 was raised for the club via Pro Range Bag purchases.  These bags are made here in Missouri, are VERY high quality and feature three pistol 'rugs' and a removable magazine holding shooting pad.  All seams are double stitched, all velcro is industrial quality and all zippers are reenforced.

Another great company is Unique AR's, (www.unique-ars.com) who make freefloat handguards for AR-platform firearms.  Their design is very good, they use a proprietary barrel nut that is easy to install and the handguards are all made of high-strength aluminum with custom cut outs.  If you buy one through my link or because you saw it recommended here, please do me a favor and let them know that "Olsen Training Group" sent you.

Maxpedition (http://www.maxpedition.com) is another company that we will be selling.  Their high end gear bags and morale patches will be available soon and I will post here as soon as they become available as well as what we will be stocking.  I can get them for less than MSRP.

For survival supplies, we will be a stocking Thrive merchant.  More info on that, my lovely wife will be running that portion of the business.

As well as running firearms safety/CCW training I will be building AR uppers for sale and will be selling black powder cap-and-ball pistols.   AR uppers will be built around Aero Precision/Surplus Ammo stripped uppers, barrels from a few different sources (Alpha Shooting Sports, Black Hole Products, SSE Machining) and Midwest Industries handguards.  The Cap-n-ball pistols will be Armi San Marcos gift sets and single pistols.

Exciting stuff is coming!

Range Report #2 - hung-up buffer ends the day early

We made it out to Ultimate Defense (http://www.udrange.com) on 6/11/2013 and shot both the P238 we picked up on 6/4/2013 and my AR pistol.

First magazine (TAC powder 55 gr FMJ hand loads) worked great  four round rapid fire strings all stayed on paper and the majority were on target at 20m - Holographic sights feel like cheating! - but 15 rounds into the American Eagle 55gr FMJ the bolt recoiled behind the bolt stop and stayed there.  I removed the magazine (still had 15 rounds in it) and since the bolt hadn't gone back forward yet there was no round in the chamber.

I tried to lever the bolt free by yanking really hard on the charging handle to no avail.  Thankfully, the armorer at the range was able to free the buffer whose roll pin had worked loose just enough to hang up on the recoil spring.  Since the bumper on the buffer was VERY brittle and rather cut up I ended the day and ordered a new buffer from the Equipment Exchange on ar15.com.  I got the replacement buffer on 6/14 and my pistol is back in serviceable condition.

Now to try out the 55gr soft points I have loaded over 24gr of IMR 4064 powder I got at the Machinist Hall gun show last weekend...

Howler's Den calls out pro-gunnies on the EO's from POTUS

Holwer's Den called out a couple guys on ARFcom in regards to the negative response that the Executive Orders that President Obama laid out earlier this year.

Here's the rebuttal I posted which may or may not be posted to their site, I have no idea if they actually allow more discussion than other anti-gun sites do.  I have been banned from several for being 'a shill for the NRA' or being 'off message'.  These are my opinions of the EOs that I have shared on several other forums and FaceBook pages since they were first published. 

"A rebuttal:

"1. Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal agencies to make relevant data available to the federal background check system."

This makes sense to me and falls well within the purview of the POTUS' abilities; all Executive branch agencies should work together. This is an internal 'play nice' from their boss/our Employee the POTUS.

"2. Address unnecessary legal barriers, particularly relating to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, that may prevent states from making information available to the background check system."

How is the Federal government allowing government bodies to violate HIPPA a good thing? Please, explain this to me. If someone was adjudicated and forcibly remanded to state mental healthcare, this is a public record so HIPPA has no bearing. this is what the NICS is interested in. Or is this going to allow fishing expeditions based upon privileged doctor/patient information?

"3. Improve incentives for states to share information with the background check system."

This should mean that states that have been conforming (such as Missouri) the whole time that NICS has been around should be rewarded. Somehow I don't see that happening and instead I see this as trying to 'slap around' states who are non-compliant. Considering that the NICS has been in place for a couple of decades, there has been plenty of time for states to send representation to the federal level to get this repealed. "game on" as it were to the non-compliant states.

"4. Direct the Attorney General to review categories of individuals prohibited from having a gun to make sure dangerous people are not slipping through the cracks."

#4 is rather troubling considering the continuation of US PATRIOT Act and the failure of indefinite detention to be removed from NDAA 2011 as well as several other actions and threats made by the executive branch over the last 12+ years. 'Domestic terrorist' lists similar to the 'no fly' list that has zero oversight?

#5 is somewhat ok, I'd rather see a federal database that is publicly searchable for recovered stolen/seized firearms. Verification of ownership and access to their Right to Keep and bear Arms is fine, but looking at the 'List' in #4 this could be troubling if determination of ownership of a specific type of weapon puts one in a 'restricted' class.

If #13 includes a recommendation from the DoJ to NOT allow plea deals in cases where any weapon was used to commit a crime, I'd be ok with that as long as Castle Doctrine and no duty to retreat come into effect and DA's are unable to go after defensive gun use when employed by those who are not barred from using their 2nd Amendment right to self defense with a firearm.

The EO's in and of themselves are relatively benign but looking at the direction that we have been going since the Oklahoma City bombing and 9/11 they can been seen in a negative light. The other issue is that even if the current Administration does nothing to curtail rights, who is to say that future ones won't?

Oh, if you want to publish my personal information, feel free. I am the interim Chairman of the Democratic Gun Owners' Caucus of Missouri, a member of the Blue Steel Democrats and run the blog at www.armedliberalinmo.blogspot.com so any publicity or additional memberships you want to send my way, please feel free. ;)

My wife is an immigrant from Canada who is working on her Citizenship so I am not doing anything that would impede her progress.

Again, this is the view of someone who identifies as a Liberal, feels that Civil Rights are held by no one if anyone's are disrupted and disagrees that we need as much federal government as we have.

Thanks,
Armed Liberal in MO"

Oh yeah, they did respond.  A very polite "Thanks, but we disagree".  They seemed intrigued that there are Liberals who tend to vote Democrat yet actually *LIKE* firearms.  The shock!  ;)

They also posted some personal info on other blog posts of RKBA activists.  I'm not sure why they did that, it seems that it would potentially put folks in harm's way but I am not sure if that would be the folks whose family and addresses were printed or those who would seek to do them harm...

Book of Grudges

A long time ago I had a different hobby.  It was Warhammer Fantasy and I played the Dwarf Kingdom.  GW Dwarves are a surley lot and their High King is transported around on a special throne.  This throne was made of a book, the Book of Grudges.

This is my Book of Grudges.

Over the past year of building my AR pistol, I have run into several companies that just did not want to take my money.  Either they would say something stupid and I'd get into a 'FaceBook/Email Rumble' with them or they would have something negative on their website that I took issue with or else esposed some political belief outside of the Right to Keep and Bear Arms that I just could not support.

Today, that was Molon Labe Industries.

There is a graphic going around stating that the major mass murders of the 20th century were Liberals.  They put this up on their site and I stated an objection to it.  I made the statement that this is not the time to try and divide the RKBA community by Conservative/Liberal lines.  Their supporters continued that screed and I ended up unliking their page after I suggested that they post their anti-Liberal bias directly on their website and that I had helped close to 40 AR's be started to be built via a group buy of stripped lowers.

I will not be buying any of their 2.5 million projected polymer magazines on the primary market.  I may buy them on the secondary market but even that is in doubt.

They are now on my list of Traitors to RKBA.  We need to bring all of the activists that feel that our civil rights include the Right to Keep and Bear Arms together to keep the pressure on Congress and our state assemblies or else the bullshit laws that will accomplish nothing but the loss of control to the GOP at all levels. 

Any company that espouses a love of firearms ownership need to either be clear about not wanting Liberals to support them or any of their causes or else they need to play nice.  We Liberal gun owners catch enough crap from our 'fellow' liberals that feel that we should die due to our enjoyment of firearms or wanting to have effective tools available for our self defense. 

While the Conservatives are doing a great job of voicing their dissent, Democratic elected officials tend to listen more to their base.  If we fall silent on this issue, there is a good sense that it would be seen as 'consent'.  With no Liberal support, the war to retain our Right to Keep and Bear Arms will be a lost cause.

Just something for anti-Liberal Conservatives to consider.

You need us as much as we need you on this issue.  Help us be able to be good example to others who have not considered the reasons why we are fighting for this issue and you will have our support.

NRA-ILA ice cream social

On August 4th I was invited to go to an Ice Cream Social at the new NRA-ILA office in St Charles, MO. I signed in but did not take the 'Vote Obama Out' sticker that they were using to track who had signed in. They now have my name, address and the new email address for my volunteer position with the LGC.

There were some very earnest folks there. I did hear terms bandied about that I had anticipated hearing such as "socialism", "anti-gunners" and "Liberal" used as negative terms.

What I did learn was that despite being told the contrary, my perception of the NRA-ILA being vocally Republican was correct. I don't think that there has been a Democrat (non-DINO) in a place of leadership since the
ILA was formed.

When the NRA-ILA is willing to allow non-Conservative views to be expressed as part of their platform or at least not spending members' money on Conservative issues, I will consider joining.

So, who is the new Director of Merchandising for the Liberal Gun Club?

This guy! 

The Club President has been swamped for over the last year with things more important than t-shirts, bumper stickers and coffee mugs.  "How can that be?" you might ask.  Well, sometimes you have to ask for help to get things done, and he did.

What this means is that I get to find places that are either using 'Made in the US' swag, union workers to put designs on things or both.  With luck, I can find a Print on Demand company that does both or the result will be that only our custom orders will fill that goal.  I'm trying to not have a metric assload of swag being stored at my house with the LGC emblems on them.

If anyone has any leads on businesses that could be used, I'd appreciate it greatly.

Lower is 100% finished

Went to the gun show today in St Charles, MO and got the parts needed to finish off my lower.  I got my buffer and spring from Mark's Armory's buttstocks and buffers page and am very pleased with it.

Since my last update, I have done the following:

• Sprayed the lower and grip with Rust-Oleum Dark Taupe paint and flat clear coat.
• Done a simple whip-tie with tan 550 para cord on the buffer tube.
• Attached a single-point to two point sling adapter on the rear plate consisting of 550 para cord tied with a bowline on a bite into the loop and a pair of standard bowlines on the ends.

Buffer tube installed

I fixed the issue I had with the front pivot pin detent without having to buy anything new or fancy.  I found a steel nail that was 3/32" in diameter and cut a length of it that would work as the detent.  Installation of this improvised detent pin went far better than the one supplied by CMMG.  Front pivot pin is now working as designed.

At this point, the last bits I need for my lower is the buffer (going with an "H" carbine buffer to start with) and the buffer spring.  Once I have those, I'll get a few cans of Rust-Oleum 'nutmeg' and 2-3 cans of clear flat enamel.  After the paint dries, I'll be wrapping the buffer with coyote 550 paracord.  I may add some red paracord into the mix to show off the weave pattern, not sure at this time.

Current plan for the upper will go one of two ways.  Either I'll drop $350 + S/H on a DSArms 11.5" flattop upper w/bolt carrier group or I'll part an 11.5" upper together.  It just depends on finances.  Odds are that I'll be parting one up with parts from Surplus Ammo which would cost more in the long run but would mean less money put out at once.  Since I have the vice blocks for the upper assembly as well as a good armorer's tool from ATI, I'm not worried either way.

Why does a Liberal use the Gadsen Flag as an image?

Why does a Liberal use the Gadsden Flag as an image? 
Isn't that the image of the Tea Party? 

Not really.  The yellow field backed Gadsden flag was started to be used by the Tea Party movement to show that they were fed up with the direction that the USA was taking after a black man was elected to the POTUS.  I held that symbol in very high esteem for most of my adult life and hated that a group that I found so disagreeable 'co-opted' it. 

At that point, I decided that as a counter-point symbol, the First Navy Jack should be used by Liberals, especially those of us closer to Classic Liberalism than Progressivism to show our lack of trust in the Establishmentarians that created the Tea Party Movement as well as the same demographic that is controlling both the GOP and the Dems. 

We've seen since 2010 that the ONLY THING that the TP Congress members want is NOT less government (none of these junior Congress critters are forgoing their expense accounts or running smaller staffed offices and have done nothing to effectively shrink the Federal government)but to get the sitting POTUS out using any means necessary such as government shutdown threats and scorched earth tactics.  It seems that they are worried that if this POTUS looks good.

I am a bit of an odd duck.  I see the Federal and State governments as necessary villains to assist individuals in their ability to keep their personal rights as well as to provide those things that individuals may not be able to provide for themselves, such as public schooling, health care facilities, common defense and emergency services.  I also see Corporations the way that Thomas Jefferson did. An Aristocracy of Corporations, indeed.

I close with the last political note from that great man, sent ahead to the 50th anniversary of the signing of that beautiful act of Treason, the Declaration of Independence:

“May (July 4) be to the world, what I believe it will be -- to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all -- the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government. That form (of government) which we have substituted, restores the free right to the unbounded exercise of reason and freedom of opinion. All eyes are opened, or opening, to the rights of man. The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God.”

It begins!

On Friday I excersized by 2nd Amendment rights and have now started my AR build.
     *  Smith & Wesson M&P-15 stripped lower
     *  Pearce Grips AR-1911 grip adaptor
     *  Custom 1911 stocks from my buddy Tim's Etsy store in their green respendant Liberal Gun Club selves.

Got the grips installed and within two weeks I will have the lower parts kit.  I'll have to remove the grips in order to get the selecter/safety detent pin and spring installed as I do not have those parts just yet.

We celebrated how quickly I passed the form 4473 process (I did forgo my paranoid fears and put my SSN # on the form.  I have no doubt that this helped) by going to Ultimate Defense and getting some trigger time on their rental S&W M&P-15 and my DW put 50 .45 ACP downrange on their rental Springfield Government 1911A1. 

It turns out that since the NRA was in town, KMOV 4 wanted to get some information on women who shoot guns after speaking with Mr Bastian (owner of UDRange.com) at the NRA Annual Meeting and Trade Show earlier Friday afternoon.  They did interview Ms ALIMO but only used footage of her and not her interview.  I overcame my temptation of putting my Liberal Gun Club hat on her for the interview.  LOL

I did not attend the National Meeting and Trade Show for one simple reason.  I am not an NRA-ILA member and have no interest in joining at this time but may in the future if they decide to agree that the Right to Keep and Bear Arms is _NOT_ just a Conservative position but one for all people.  In the past, the NRA fought for gun rights for individiuals and supported politicians that did the same.  At some point after Mr la Pierre took over, the tone and targets changed.  Now the NRA is working to increase teh gun rights for those who would most greatly benefit the firearms manufacturers and Conservative interests.  For example, in 2004 and 2008, the NRA backed several Democrats and Independants that held strong RKBA beliefs and had histories of working to preserve these rights.  In 2008, a feaver pitch was reached when 'OBAMA WILL STEAL YOUR GUNS!' was the battle-cry.  In 2010, all non-Republicans were thrown under the bus.  Now in 2012 the 'OBAMA WILL STEAL YOUR GUNS!' is the message again, causing there to be major runs on guns and ammo.

The current run on guns and ammo will keep me from finishing my AR-15 rifle build in May as I had initially planned.  Manufacturers are hitting it huge, orders are piling up and things are going out of stock faster than they are being replaced.  Even the manufacturers that historically are on the bottom end of acceptable are getting record orders and have waiting lists for shipping dates.

The level of FUD spread like pasture pucks has gotten out of hand.  Membership in the Liberal Gun Club is growing daily.

And here are some pics of my build in progress: