Just finished teaching a MAG-80 second-level 40-hour class in Illinois.  Handgun, carbine and shotgun; long range and short; wounded defender return fire techniques and shooting on the move and taking maximum advantage of cover; gun retention and disarming, and more.  Student evaluations came out to 9.94 on a 10-scale.

A lot of the credit for that goes to our teaching cadre, which included former national champion Bob Houzenga, Andy Kemp, Jim Fitzpatrick and Philippa Coates, among others. But credit also goes to our host facility, the Illinois State Rifle Association near Kankakee.

Rich Pearson has led Is ISRA to its status as one of the most effective state-level gun owners’ civil rights organizations in the country.  Along with Illinois Carry and Guns Save Lives, ISRA gets a big piece of the credit for Illinois establishing shall-issue concealed handgun carry some five years ago.  They are second to none in promotion of shooting sports and safety classes.  ISRA each year ramrods IGOLD, the Illinois Gun Owners’ Legislative Day, where thousands of law-abiding gun owners march in Springfield, the state capitol, each year.  ISRA has been extraordinarily successful in fighting anti-gun legislation and promoting pro-gun bills.

More info at http://www.isra.org/.

5 COMMENTS

  1. Illinois State Rifle Association has done and continues to be the heavy lifting guns rights organization. Every gun owner should be a member. ISRA is continually in Springfield lobbying for its members and getting the word out when the Illinois General Assembly won’t stay in their lane. Shout out to evil range master Jeff. And, huge thanks to Midwest Training Group and Massad Ayoob.

  2. It’s great to hear about ISRA’s success in Illinois. New Jersey has gone backwards and gotten worse. Governor Phil Murphy will soon sign six new anti-gun bills into law.

    It’s odd how education can open some minds, but not others. Phil Murphy is great at making money, but is otherwise unenlightened. Oh well, I have my blind spots too.

    • After thinking about what I wrote, I’m sure Governor Murphy is smart and educated. He probably just wants unchallenged power. That means no guns for us peons or serfs.

      My point about education not really working so well has more to do with my thoughts about voters. Can’t they look around the world and see that “BIG” government doesn’t work as well as small government? Actually, we don’t have to look around the world anymore. We can see what Democrats did to Detroit and California. We can see that Texas did not participate in the Great Recession of Obama’s years. And we can see how the economy is doing under Trump’s leadership versus how it was doing under Obama’s leadership.

      Consider this: All Americans go to high school, and about half of us go to college too. Our educational experiences are similar to each other. Yet, there were plenty of people, like me, who were afraid of what Obama wanted to do to this country. Now, people who have been educated similar to myself, are afraid of what Trump will do to this country. This is an incredible contrast. These are two groups of people who are at opposite ends of a political spectrum. We have similar educations, and yet we view politics so differently. How can these two groups of people, Left and Right, continue to live under the same laws? Education is not a cure-all.

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