gotta love deb saunders

debra saunders is one of my favorite writers in the san francisco chronicle. this paper is a deplorable partisan rag, but it does have a few redeeming factors. one of them is saunders. and i'm not sure what the hell is going on, but lately i've noticed a few other conservative, or at least right of left wing whackjob, articles and authors showing up. today, she wrote a great article about that abhorrent Preparation H, uh... Proposition H, which requires LEGAL owners possessing LEGALLY obtained, and LEGALLY kept handguns to turn them in by 1 April, without compensation.
i will quote one section, but i suggest you visit the above link to read the whole article for yourself. this is just another example of of the mindset so prevalent in places like san francisco, where it's ok to think, or act, or behave, or live, but only if it's the way I want you to.

Here's an interesting statistic, compiled by the SFPD and reported in The Chronicle last month: Of the 94 homicides recorded in the city through Dec. 12, no arrests had been made in 74 of those murders. Only eight cases have resulted in prosecutions.

Sorry, but if gang members think they can kill without getting caught, I don't think a handgun ban is going to crimp their style.

Police say that witnesses to homicides often are reluctant to testify. This suggests it would make more sense to put the resources used to defend Prop. H -- which by the mayor's own admission is a very expensive public-opinion poll -- into witness protection and investigative programs.

San Francisco is supposed to stand for choice. This is supposed to be a town where tolerant individuals don't pass laws that, in essence, say: If I don't do it, you shouldn't either; if you do, you go to jail. Yet the gun ban ends choice -- for the law-abiding, at least.

and along the lines of handgun ownership, i went to the range the other day. i took a couple of 22's and my new SA TRP (dayam, i love that gun). I'd loaded some 200 grain lead semi-wad cutters with bullseye powder, from 3.5 grains to 5.5 grains, 20 bullets at each increment for a total of 100. i went to test out my new loads, and see if i could find an accurate one using semi-wad cutters. i think the optimum load using bullseye is between 3.7 and 4.3 grains. i'll load 20 at each 1/10 grain increment and check them out. the 4.0 grain load did the best, with a number of fliers (my fault i'm sure), and 12 bullets into a 2 1/2 in hole at 15 yards off hand. we'll see. i'll do the same with several other powders, to see if i can tailor a round for me and the way i shoot that specific gun. damn, i love this gun-geek stuff.
anyway, i was making a lot of noise firing off the .45 (it's an indoor range). the next station over was occupied by a dad and his 15-16 year old son. they had just gotten back from some basketball tournament, and stopped off for a little light shooting. they were shooting i think a sig mosquito in 22. the snippets of conversation i heard over my booms was that they were having fun, but were really unhappy with the accuracy.
so i dug out my Ruger Mark II Government model .22, and loaned it to them to shoot.
click to see larger image i've done a full target trigger job, with overtravel stop and a hand radiused sear and trigger, so that it pops at somewhere around 28 ounces, crisp as an apple. it's wearing hogue rubber contour grips, and a 3 minute ultradot red dot sighting system, that only shines a red spot where you are shooting inside the optic, without actually projecting the dot, with no magnification to get in the way of actually having to figure out where to put the dot. it WILL hit what you target out to at least 50 yards, which is where i like to play. it's easily capable of shooting 1 inch groups off hand at 25 yards. they shot off something like 300 rounds of CCI minimags they brought, which is what i sighted in with. all i heard was whoops and yahoos for the next 30 minutes.
i was glad to help make their day at the range memorable.
an observation: i really hate teenage boys with firearms. not that i think they shouldn't shoot. i just think they shouldn't shoot when i'm around. it's really embarrassing to have some punk 15 year old with great eyes and no handshakes from caffeine overload and age crow about the one hole groups he can shoot with MY OWN DAMNED GUN. i may just have to limit my gun loans to geezers like me. it sure would be easier on my ego.