{"id":3588,"date":"2016-02-02T13:18:55","date_gmt":"2016-02-02T17:18:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/?p=3588"},"modified":"2016-02-02T13:18:55","modified_gmt":"2016-02-02T17:18:55","slug":"from-the-questionable-idea-of-the-month-department","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/from-the-questionable-idea-of-the-month-department\/","title":{"rendered":"FROM THE QUESTIONABLE IDEA OF THE MONTH DEPARTMENT"},"content":{"rendered":"

In November, a starry-eyed professor postulated that the first cartridge in every police officer\u2019s gun should be a blank<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Had the prof done the slightest bit of research, he would have learned that blanks won\u2019t cycle the slide of a semiautomatic service pistol, leaving the gun \u201cjammed\u201d after the first futile loud noise. To make an auto pistol work with blanks for TV and movies, the gun has to be altered in such a way that it can no longer safely fire live ammunition. In a situation where you are on the defensive and have to shoot or die in an instant, loading a defensive weapon with blanks is not only spectacularly stupid, it can be fatally stupid.<\/p>\n

In December, some rocket scientist decides the safest way to identify your target before you fire is by pressing your trigger\u2026to activate gun-mounted white light\u00a0what-could-possibly-go-wrong\/ .\u00a0 The first prototype I saw like this was 25 years ago that the inventor had planted on a Glock, leaving the shooter a startle-twitch away from shooting anything in the light beam that surprised him. We laughed at it then. It\u2019s better to laugh than to cry now, a quarter century later.<\/p>\n