Firearms Friday: Grips

When practicing my pistol grip the other day I started thinking about all the other sports when I found myself in this routine. It really is interesting when you think about the commonalities that can be found across three completely different sports… golf, baseball, and shooting. Of course there are drastic difference between the three as well but for the sake of this post I will focus my thoughts, as I did the other day, on the grips.

Like most kids growing up I played baseball every year and over time I picked up more and more techniques and learned the proper way to do things including many of the basics including how to properly hold a baseball and, as it pertains to this stream of consciousness, how to grip a bat. While most see a bat and simple grab it there is actually a method to the grip to maximize bat speed. Basically, you start the bat at the tips of your fingers and roll the bat toward the palm. For some the knob is part of the grip to capitalize on the leverage gained by the additional circumference. By gripping the bat this way you completely free up your wrists allowing for full extension during your swing.

Gripping a golf club is completely different from holding a baseball bat but it also brings us a little closer to a handgun grip. While you want your wrists to be as free as possible when swinging a bat, your wrists should be locked when holding a golf club. This is why you place the club in your palm and you’re your fingers around it with both your thumbs in line pointing at the ball. Strength is also not your friend when it comes to golf as you should have a firm grip on the club but only enough to keep it in your hand. Any more and you risk tilting the head and sending your shot right or left. You can see this at the range all the time.

That last part sound familiar, doesn’t it? When working on my pistol grip there is actually more commonalities with a golf club grip than that of a baseball bat. I do my best to get a high purchase, line up my thumb just below the slide, bring my support hand with my fingers at a 45 degree angle along the front pulling toward my body and down, and line up my thumb just under the other. The part I am really working on is that support hand angle as this is what is really locking in my wrists, forcing the recoil into my shoulders, and allowing me to be firm but not flex with my other hand. This allows for relaxed initial engagements, quick follow up shots, and little in the way of pushing or pulling the trigger. Again, you can see this at the range all the time.

Understandably this is a very basic overview but it was an interesting chain of thoughts that I wanted to share. I am sure I am not the only one that has had this slinky moving through their mind and it just goes to show how closely muscle memory and actual memory are tied together. If we can tap into that it might be a little easier to retrain yourself at the range… you never know. It might work.

Technology Can Only Go So Far!

My job which is by no means critical to the security of the country requires me to get information as quickly and efficiently as possible and disseminate that information in a like manner. The majority of the time email will not deliver the results in a satisfactory manner as it does not permit immediate follow up and the process of obtaining all the necessary information can string across multiple correspondences. Even when a dialog has taken place over multiple emails, a call is sometimes still required. By this time, actionable items have passed and deadlines are sometimes pushed back to those projects with remaining viability.

Picking up the phone can cut out much of the time and get me the answers and information I need to take immediate action on a given topic. However, whenever possible, in person meetings are by far the best means by which to get a complete picture on a subject in an efficient manner. Whenever I am given the opportunity to meet with someone, I always make the time. Quality information and program efficiency are two of the keys to a successful PR campaign. Really, they are the drivers in any high volume industry that requires immediate decisions and actions.

There are times when in person briefings, meetings, and information sessions are not possible but I do everything I can to avoid missing the opportunity. This is why the recent report released by the Government Accountability Institute, a conservative watchdog group, were a little mystifying. In that report they report that President Obama has had in-person intelligence briefings during only 42% of his days in office which is slightly lower than the figure reported in 2012. Previously, the White House has addressed the subject saying that the President “doesn’t feel the need to have a daily in-person briefing, but that he reads his intelligence briefing daily on his secure iPad and often sends emails with follow up questions.”

At the very least he should have taken someone from the intelligence community with him golfing. Even if those were his only meetings he might still be over 42%. Heck, he could even have them get some intelligence on how to play particular holes. That could be a win-win scenario.

While I don’t know the statistics from previous administrations it seems that any executive that conducts his intelligence briefings in such a way would be hard pressed to be an effective, well informed, and overall decisive leader. I can’t effectively do my job without having all of the information in my hands as soon as possible. The percentage seems a little too low especially given how many events that have occurred (that we know about) over the past six years. But, let’s give him the benefit of the doubt, maybe all those golf outings are just a rouse and the real briefings occur at the third bunker to the right of the 17^th hole at precisely 10:54am.

Leaving Things Unfinished

While it inevitably happens from time to time, I hate leaving things that are half finished but sometimes other priorities come to the fore and there is no other option. Eventually, I go back and complete that item or project but there is generally no guarantee when that will happen. However, that task is always on my mind and it doesn’t take much for me to return to the work that was once abandoned.

I was reminded of this when hearing the president speak last week. Unfortunately, his hand had to be forced in order to return to an unfinished war. There was no golf course to which he could retreat that would hide him away from that speech that you could tell he was dreading. When the words were spoken we listened hoping that we would hear of a solution that we could all stand behind. For many of us, the ‘solution’ presented fell far short of what we wanted to hear.  

The threat that we currently face from ISIL is one that many of use feared would grow out of our abrupt departure from the region. We hoped to hear of an all-out campaign to obliterate this terrorist organization that some report to be as much as 31,000 strong. While we have been engaging in targeted strikes, this does not seem to be stemming their growth. We need to show strength but we were left with the following rhetoric from the president:

Now, it will take time to eradicate a cancer like ISIL.  And any time we take military action, there are risks involved –- especially to the servicemen and women who carry out these missions.  But I want the American people to understand how this effort will be different from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  It will not involve American combat troops fighting on foreign soil.  This counterterrorism campaign will be waged through a steady, relentless effort to take out ISIL wherever they exist, using our air power and our support for partner forces on the ground.  This strategy of taking out terrorists who threaten us, while supporting partners on the front lines, is one that we have successfully pursued in Yemen and Somalia for years.  And it is consistent with the approach I outlined earlier this year:  to use force against anyone who threatens America’s core interests, but to mobilize partners wherever possible to address broader challenges to international order. 

With a government a mere days old at the time of the speech and our greatest source of intelligence in the region, Israel, having to fight alone to defend their borders, we have little regional support that could counter this growing threat. There are times when overwhelming force is not the answer but this is not one of those situations. We gave up once, we let this threat grow unchecked, and we failed in finishing the job. We can’t let that happen again and trying to claim victory from a distance is not a viable solution.

There is a time for rhetoric… not now. There is a time for negotiations… not now. There is a time to let others handle the problem… not now, we started it. There is a time to step on their necks and not stop until they are wiped off the map and relegated to the biography of a failed president… that time is now. Now is the time to claim victory and fight for the peace and stability of the region.

WTF Of The Week: Missouri Riots Edition

Throughout this past week I have been listening to the radio, reading the articles, and watching the news surrounding the protests, riots, and general insanity taking place in Ferguson, Missouri. I have been hearing people talk about the militarization of the police in the this country and I have been watching Al Sharpton stirring up the crowds filling the streets in an attempt to further incite the racial hatred that continues to brew. All of this stemming from a tragic incident that no one is able to explain or even tell you exactly what happened. The only thing we really know for certain is that a community is so pissed off that they have decided to riot and tear apart their own community.

Yeah, I don’t understand it either.  

This is one of those events that is playing out across this country fueled by visceral reactions. Like many of the other polarizing heinous acts that we have all witnessed, people are taking to social media, writing editorials, and screaming from the sidelines without having any facts to support their intense feelings. This incident has also served as the jumping off point to further the agenda of those looking for a reason to leverage race to make and accusation of racism and inequality…. like Al Sharpton.

This just goes to show that the fact that we do have are being forgotten namely that we doing know what happened and that tragedy doesn’t have a race. Insisting that tragedy is associated with race is inherently racist. But this is what debates have come to today especially those that touch upon, in any way shape or form, politics. Knowing that we have a crappy President is, according to today’s standards, racist. Forget the fact that he is just a crap President who has played more rounds of golf since he took office than Tiger Woods (look it up).

And it is this liberal mentality that has many newspaper outlets scared. It doesn’t matter if you are telling the truth about what is going on in Ferguson. If people don’t like what the picture is portraying they will let you know and, in the case of the Philadelphia Daily News, force the publication to change the cover. After all, media is a business. And with newspaper sales in the toilet, they can’t afford to alienate any readers. It’s not like the days when you your audience was so expansive that you didn’t have to worry about losing part of your audience. Of course, at that time people cared about the facts more than the emotion.

Given that the more confrontational and overall vocal portion of the audience is of the liberal persuasion, this is a big reason why journalism is beginning to rot away under heavy liberal bias required by much of the readership. Facts have become secondary as credible sources and quality reporting have become a target of doubt rather than news. Only time will tell if this will bring about the eventual downfall of the media as we used to know it or if the media polarization will soon neutralize and return to an unbiased state (or at least get close).  

Turning Off The World And Relaxing

Lately my wife and I have been struggling with turning our minds off and allowing ourselves to relax. It’s an interesting juxtaposition in that as soon as we started slowing down on the weekends and spending more time at home “relaxing” we started having issues taking it easy. And it hasn’t been for a lack of trying but sometimes what worked in the past doesn’t necessarily work now.

My issue has always been that I need to have something to keep my mind busy in order for my mind to relax. At the same time, I need to take some time off during the weekend from the daily tasks of the week so my mind is left to fend for itself. Of course, posting on this blog and the Phillies blog keep me busy every day but that still leaves a large chunk of time unaccounted for.

Occasionally, television is a good refuge but it is becoming increasingly difficult with the poo that is smeared across the dial. Some days it seems like every channel has some form of Honey Boo Boo or Obama Boo Boo on it and I have no other choice than to turn the darn thing off. Even the History channel, normally a reliable fallback, seems to have more and more content focused on ghosts and aliens.

Books provide a pleasant respite from the noise of the world but even that has become a difficult endeavor as either it is too quite which allows my mind to enter into the fray or my eyes are too heavy to focus which is usually the situation during the week. I have only been able to escape into the pages of historical volumes for fleeting moments when the larger task at hand is centered on coloring in the leaves of the family tree. Those are the brief and intense moments that are both tiring and refreshing as everything else around me disappears. It’s like taking a nap in the middle of the day… it will get you through the next couple of hours but it can’t replace a good night’s sleep.

To, hopefully, address this issue there are a few things that I will be reintroducing in the next week or so which hopefully will satiate my need to relax and recharge all of which revolve around one simple task… getting the frick out of the apartment. Traveling and returning to the synagogue for regular weekly services is what we both need to do to keep us going, keep us relaxed, and keep us grounded. We can do these things together and enjoy the common experiences. However, there is one thing that I need to do by myself (because I can’t convince my wife to go)… I need to get to the range.

Just the thought of that makes me feel better. Some people look forward to the relaxation of playing a round of golf or competing with their friends on the basketball court but that is not for me. I enjoy competing with myself, and frequently with those around me, by seeing who is the best at putting holes in paper. For many of you this may seem like a crazy concept but this is honestly one of the most effective ways for me to relax.

If you take your time, respect the firearm, and focus acutely on hitting the bulls eye the world around you disappears and all your attention is on the task at hand. Regardless of skill or ability, I have seen everyone reach that state of complete focus. This is the only sport where I have felt a complete sense of peace and calm. This is my respite in the midst of a chaotic week.

So, that is how I relax. What works for you?