Jay McDaniel

Windows: In most situations, IM apps like Hangouts will do fine for your instant messaging needs. If you need something more local, though, LAN Messenger can help.

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Smartphone stands are a dime a dozen, but a solid tablet stand is slightly harder to DIY on the cheap. Instructables user ArvidJense decided the best approach was to modify an old CD spindle.

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Heads-up displays (transparent displays that let drivers see data without looking down) are built-in on some modern luxury cars, but if you're not lucky enough to have one, here's how to make your own. It's a relatively cheap and easy project, but you'll need some soldering experience and familiarity with Arduino.

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For ten years Pamela Jones has run Groklaw, a site collecting, discussing, and explaining legal developments of interest to the open-source software community. Her efforts have, justifiably, won many awards.

She's done now.

Running a blog long-term can be exhausting, irritating, and sometimes discouraging. Creative efforts have arcs, with a beginning and an end. If Jones were closing up shop because she's had enough and has accomplished what she set out to do, I would be sorry to see her go, but it would be the kind of sorry you feel when you finish a good book.

That's not why she's stopping.

Pamela Jones is ending Groklaw because she can't trust her government. She's ending it because, in the post-9/11 era, there's no viable and reliable way to assure that our email won't be read by the state — because she can't confidently communicate privately with her readers and tipsters and subjects and friends and family.

I hope that makes it clear why I can't continue. There is now no shield from forced exposure. Nothing in that parenthetical thought list is terrorism-related, but no one can feel protected enough from forced exposure any more to say anything the least bit like that to anyone in an email, particularly from the US out or to the US in, but really anywhere. You don't expect a stranger to read your private communications to a friend. And once you know they can, what is there to say? Constricted and distracted. That's it exactly. That's how I feel.

So. There we are. The foundation of Groklaw is over. I can't do Groklaw without your input. I was never exaggerating about that when we won awards. It really was a collaborative effort, and there is now no private way, evidently, to collaborate.

In making this choice, Jones echoes the words of Lavar Levison, who shut down his encrypted email service Lavabit. Levison said he was doing so rather than "become complicit in crimes against the American people":

“I’m taking a break from email,” said Levison. “If you knew what I know about email, you might not use it either.”

Lavabit was joined by encryption provider Silent Circle:

“We’ve been thinking about this for some time, whether it was a good idea at all. Yesterday, another secure email provider, Lavabit, shut down their system lest they ‘be complicit in crimes against the American people.’ We see the writing on the wall, and we have decided that it is best for us to shut down Silent Mail.”

The extent of NSA surveillance is unknown, but what little we see is deeply unsettling. What our government says about it can't be believed; the government uses deliberately misleading language or outright lies about the scope of surveillance.

So I don't blame Pamela Jones or question her decision. It's not the only way. I don't think it's my way, yet — though I am having some very concerned conversations about whether it's safe, or even ethical, to have confidential attorney-client communications by email.

I hope that Pamela's decision will arouse the interest, or attention, or outrage, of a few more people, who will in turn talk and write and advocate to get more people involved. Groklaw was a great resource; citizens will care that it's gone. (The government and its minions won't.)

Pamela's choice will likely be met with the usual arguments: the government doesn't care about your emails. If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to worry about. This is about protecting us from terrorist attacks, not about snooping into Americans' communications. Don't you remember 9/11?

I tire of responding to those. Let me offer one response that applies to all of them: I don't trust my government, I don't trust the people who work for my government, and I believe that the evidence suggests that it's irrational to offer such trust.

Let me close by repeating my four points from yesterday that guide my evaluation of such matters, this time without links:

1. The government lies to you about the extent of its surveillance of you.

2. The government says it needs secrecy, but lies about its secrets and the grounds for keeping them secret.

3. The government says it needs expanded powers to fight terrorism, but lies: in fact it uses expanded "anti-terrorism" powers to advance a variety of domestic agendas.

4. Terrorism is whatever the government says it is.

Faced With The Security State, Groklaw Opts Out © 2007-2013 by the authors of Popehat. This feed is for personal, non-commercial use only. Using this feed on any other site is a copyright violation. No scraping.

This weekend British authorities detained David Miranda — a Brazilian citizen and partner of journalist Glenn Greenwald — for nine hours at Heathrow Airport as he traveled from Berlin to Brazil. Miranda was detained under Schedule 7 of the U.K.'s Terrorism Act of 2000, which allows up-to-nine-hour detentions at the border when British agents wish to question travelers they believe might be "concerned in the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism." British authorities reportedly took all of Miranda's electronics and electronic storage devices.

Miranda had been visiting filmmaker Laura Poitras, who has been repeatedly detained by the United States government when traveling here, and who — like Greenwald — is associated with the revelations by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

Miranda's experience was undoubtedly terrifying and infuriating. On the other hand, at least he wasn't stalked and abruptly shot seven times in the head as he lay prone on a subway floor, like his countryman Jean Charles de Menezes, whose random encounter with British anti-terrorism policy was fatal.

Responses have been varied. Many view this as an abuse of anti-terrorism measures to harass journalists and pursue leak investigations. Others say that Greenwald was using Miranda to courier documents connected to illegal leaks, and should not be surprised that Miranda was detained. (I note that nobody seriously asserts that Miranda has any connection to terrorism; the people defending or minimizing his detention seem to be asserting that it is acceptable for British authorities to use Schedule 7 to investigate the Snowden leak.)

I know what I think. But I am waiting a bit to write more in detail. As I analyze the competing arguments, my view will be informed by these points:

1. Governments lie about the scope of their surveillance measures against us.

2. Governments say that what they are doing in the war on terrorism needs to be secret, but governments have an established record of lying about their need for secrecy.

3. When governments say that they are using their powers to fight terrorists, government are lying. Government actually use their expanded powers to pursue whatever they want, including copyright infringement and the War of Drugs. Therefore it would not surprise me in the least if a nominally anti-terrorist measure were stretched here to accommodate a leak investigation.

4. Governments say that they are using their power to fight terrorists, as if the identity of "terrorists" is a static and principled matter. In fact, who is or isn't a terrorist is a political question resolved in the discretion of the government based on the balance of power at any given time, as I learned to my regret.

Those four points are mostly supported by references to U.S. actions, but I see no particular reason to expect the U.K. to act differently.

Four Points To Remember In Connection With The Detention of David Miranda © 2007-2013 by the authors of Popehat. This feed is for personal, non-commercial use only. Using this feed on any other site is a copyright violation. No scraping.

Faced with a story of outrage resulting from a rodeo clown dressing up as the President of the United States, I would like to make ten points:

1. It is right and fit that the President of the United States, whoever that is at any given moment, should be mocked, ridiculed, parodied, insulted, and generally reviled.

2. It is a good thing to live in a country where you can mock, ridicule, and revile the leader and not be arrested, disappeared, prosecuted, or murdered.

3. It is — to borrow Teddy Roosevelt's phrase — unpatriotic, servile, and morally treasonous to complain that ridiculing and mocking the President at an event like a rodeo is "disrespectful."

4. It is contemptible to suggest that there is something wrong with ridiculing the President at an event paid for with public funds. If public funds render an entertainment event the wrong venue for ridiculing public officials, then we should stop supporting entertainment events with public funds.

5. Some people hate the current President for really stupid reasons, instead of really sensible ones.

6. Some of the hatred of the current President is related to cultural factors including, but not limited to, the color of his skin.

7. Some people are going to act like a huge pain in the ass because I wrote #6, even though I said "some." These are people who will refer to any discussion of race as "race baiting."

8. Some descriptions of the announcer at the Missouri State Far asking the crowd if they would like to "see Obama run down by a bull," and whipping up crowd enthusiasm, sound extremely creepy and not fun-time-rodeo-clownish at all. If those descriptions are accurate, it is reasonable to inquire whether the display was calculated to play upon the racial and cultural factors referenced in #6, above, for a cheap cheer.

9. It's possible for a criticism of a politician to be racially tinged, and for the outcry in response to be both rational and defensible (to the extent they suggest that racially tinged crowd-pleasing is ugly) and irrational and indefensible (to the extent they suggest that there is anything wrong with a rodeo clown mocking the President).

10. Rodeo clowns don't need to confront shades of gray. Grown-ups do.

And Now, Rodeo Clowns Inspire Some Nuanced Parsing © 2007-2013 by the authors of Popehat. This feed is for personal, non-commercial use only. Using this feed on any other site is a copyright violation. No scraping.

What's the proper function of a jury in the American criminal justice system?

If you listen to some people — me, for instance — it's to act as a bulwark between the overwhelming power of the state and the individual, to hold the government to its burden of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt to a (nominally) neutral body.

That's not a particularly popular view. Expressed or not, the more popular view is that the role of a jury is to delivery a guilty verdict when the government accuses someone of a crime.

I give you two examples of this viewpoint from the past week:

In Ohio, Judge Amy Salerno berated a jury for returning a non guilty verdict in a case where she believed a guilty verdict was called for.

Salerno criticized the jurors in front of other people in the courtroom, according to the complaints. She also suggested that there would be another opportunity to convict the defendant because he was charged in another case in front of her, according to the jurors.

Salerno later sort of apologized, saying she was "surprised" by the verdict:

In an interview yesterday, Salerno said the verdict had surprised her; she echoed a printed statement she provided to The Dispatch that read: “(I) failed to contain my surprise at this particular meeting (with jurors).”

A jury's failure to convict is often a surprise to people who believe that a jury's role is to convict.

Meanwhile, at 'In These Times," Richard Baker explains why jurors are simultaneously stupid and pseudo-intellectual, and how this explains jurors frustrating justice by returning not guilty verdicts in cases like People v. Zimmerman:

The defense attorneys work their magic by convincing the jurors of their own sophistication. The jurors are lead to believe that there is much more to the case than most people realize and only a select few people with their intellectual complexity can see through it all.

Jurors, Baker feels, fail to see the simple truth that anyone should grasp: the state has accused someone, the state has claimed a set of facts, the defendant is guilty.

I don't have the stomach today to fisk this excrescence. Fortunately Gideon has done it for us.

The Proper Function of A Jury In America © 2007-2013 by the authors of Popehat. This feed is for personal, non-commercial use only. Using this feed on any other site is a copyright violation. No scraping.

It turns out that the NSA's domestic and world-wide surveillance apparatus is even more extensive than we thought. Bluntly: The government has commandeered the Internet. Most of the largest Internet companies provide information to the NSA, betraying their users. Some, as we've learned, fight and lose. Others cooperate, either out of patriotism or because they believe it's easier that way.

I have one message to the executives of those companies: fight.

Do you remember those old spy movies, when the higher ups in government decide that the mission is more important than the spy's life? It's going to be the same way with you. You might think that your friendly relationship with the government means that they're going to protect you, but they won't. The NSA doesn't care about you or your customers, and will burn you the moment it's convenient to do so.

We're already starting to see that. Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and others are pleading with the government to allow them to explain details of what information they provided in response to National Security Letters and other government demands. They've lost the trust of their customers, and explaining what they do -- and don't do -- is how to get it back. The government has refused; they don't care.

It will be the same with you. There are lots more high-tech companies who have cooperated with the government. Most of those company names are somewhere in the thousands of documents that Edward Snowden took with him, and sooner or later they'll be released to the public. The NSA probably told you that your cooperation would forever remain secret, but they're sloppy. They'll put your company name on presentations delivered to thousands of people: government employees, contractors, probably even foreign nationals. If Snowden doesn't have a copy, the next whistleblower will.

This is why you have to fight. When it becomes public that the NSA has been hoovering up all of your users' communications and personal files, what's going to save you in the eyes of those users is whether or not you fought. Fighting will cost you money in the short term, but capitulating will cost you more in the long term.

Already companies are taking their data and communications out of the US.

The extreme case of fighting is shutting down entirely. The secure e-mail service Lavabit did that last week, abruptly. Ladar Levison, that site's owner, wrote on his homepage: "I have been forced to make a difficult decision: to become complicit in crimes against the American people or walk away from nearly ten years of hard work by shutting down Lavabit. After significant soul searching, I have decided to suspend operations. I wish that I could legally share with you the events that led to my decision."

The same day, Silent Circle followed suit, shutting down their e-mail service in advance of any government strong-arm tactics: "We see the writing the wall, and we have decided that it is best for us to shut down Silent Mail now. We have not received subpoenas, warrants, security letters, or anything else by any government, and this is why we are acting now." I realize that this is extreme. Both of those companies can do it because they're small. Google or Facebook couldn't possibly shut themselves off rather than cooperate with the government. They're too large; they're public. They have to do what's economically rational, not what's moral.

But they can fight. You, an executive in one of those companies, can fight. You'll probably lose, but you need to take the stand. And you might win. It's time we called the government's actions what they really are: commandeering. Commandeering is a practice we're used to in wartime, where commercial ships are taken for military use, or production lines are converted to military production. But now it's happening in peacetime. Vast swaths of the Internet are being commandeered to support this surveillance state.

If this is happening to your company, do what you can to isolate the actions. Do you have employees with security clearances who can't tell you what they're doing? Cut off all automatic lines of communication with them, and make sure that only specific, required, authorized acts are being taken on behalf of government. Only then can you look your customers and the public in the face and say that you don't know what is going on -- that your company has been commandeered.

Journalism professor Jeff Jarvis recently wrote in the Guardian: "Technology companies: now is the moment when you must answer for us, your users, whether you are collaborators in the US government's efforts to 'collect it all -- our every move on the internet -- or whether you, too, are victims of its overreach."

So while I'm sure it's cool to have a secret White House meeting with President Obama -- I'm talking to you, Google, Apple, AT&T, and whoever else was in the room -- resist. Attend the meeting, but fight the secrecy. Whose side are you on?

The NSA isn't going to remain above the law forever. Already public opinion is changing, against the government and their corporate collaborators. If you want to keep your users' trust, demonstrate that you were on their side.

This essay originally appeared on TheAtlantic.com.

Slashdot thread. And a good interview with Lavabit's founder.

We first saw the Omate TrueSmart watch when it was announced back towards the end of July. At the time we saw some images and details of the watch. Not to mention, the company talked about plans to crowdfund the Omate TrueSmart. And well, it looks like the TrueSmart has become the latest smartwatch to land on Kickstarter.

There has been plenty of smartwatch talk in recent months and while the Samsung Gear is getting quite a bit of attention at the moment, perhaps the better known is the Pebble, which saw quite a bit of success on Kickstarter. That said, the Omate TrueSmart does have one main perk that will set it aside from other offerings — it is a standalone smartwatch.

Simply put, this one doesn’t need to be paired with a smartphone. In fact, the Omate TrueSmart has 3G connectivity. Some of the other specs include a 1.54-inch (240 x 240) multi-touch capacitive display, dual-core 1.3GHz Cortex A7 processor, 512MB of RAM, 4GB of internal storage, a microSD card slot, 600 mAh battery and 5 megapixel camera.

Remaining specs include WiFi 802.1b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0, GPS, g-sensor, e-compass and gyroscope along with a speaker and microphone. The TrueSmart also has an IP67 rating which means it is both water-resistant and dustproof. This watch will also be running Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean with v1.0 of the Omate user interface.

That all being said, perhaps the key for today is the Kickstarter pledge levels. As we often see there are a few available with some of the lower levels being limited. Things kick off at $10 for a keychain. The actual watch begins at $179 and climbs to $189 and settles in at $199.

There is also a limited run (and numbered) developer edition available for $199. This bring the when — as of now the Kickstarter page cites the expected delivery as being November. The developer edition is expected a month earlier though, in October.

SOURCE: Kickstarter

Google recently released a device tracker that allows you ring your device, see your device’s location or completely wiped the device, all from a web interface. It is without doubt an awesome feature that will help with the recovery of your lost phone. But according to the folks at CyanogenMod, it’s simply not secure enough. See, if Google’s servers were compromised (by a hacker, or even the government), everyone would suddenly be traceable. The info is sent to Google’s servers, and it can be used by someone else.

CyanogenMod’s upcoming service is a bit different. Instead of sending the information through the server, your browser instead sends a public key. The phone authenticates the public key and sends an encrypted key back. The server cannot decrypt this key; only the browser can. This establishes a secure connection that cannot be decrypted on the server side, even if someone manages to get hold of that data. Using this connection, you can track or wipe your device.

It isn’t a foolproof service. If the server was compromised and you entered your password, you would become traceable. However, that would make one user traceable, instead of all users at once. It’s not perfect, but it’s far better than Google’s service.

The service is not out yet, but will be eventually. The source code has been fully published, and the CyanogenMod devs encourage people to check the security and safety of the service. Remember, services like this are improved with the help of the users. Would you be interested in using this over Google’s service? Is this important to you? Leave a comment!

Source: CyanogenMod Blog, +CyanogenMod
Via: Engadget

The Ute backpack marks Hill People Gear’s first foray into the world of larger, multi-day packs. It’s an internal frame pack, with the structure consisting of two aluminum stays and a plastic framesheet. The reported volume of the pack is around 3,500 cubic inches.

In the past I have commented on Hill People Gear’s design ethos of field serviceable simplicity. The Ute backpack takes this idea to the next level. The components of the pack are modular, and when there’s a component that could fail — such as plastic hardware in a critical location — it’s assumed that the component will fail, and the pack is designed around this.

Disclaimer: Hill People Gear provided a production sample Ute to the author, free of charge, for the purposes of this review. No guarantees were made as to the tone or conclusions of the review.

Construction

As with most of Hill People Gear’s other products, the Ute is made in the USA by First Spear. The bag itself is made of 500 denier Cordura. The portion of the pack that sits against the user’s back and holds the suspension system is 1000 denier Cordura, for extra durability. The pack is available primarily in a two-tone color combination of Ranger Green and Khaki, but is slowly being introduced in Hill People Gear’s standard solid color offerings of Ranger Green, Coyote and Foliage.

Suspension and Support

Inside the bag, the Ute features a flat silnylon pocket against the back. This can be used as a water bladder compartment but also functions as a slot to hold the thin HDPE framesheet that helps the pack retain its shape and prevents barreling when the compression straps are tightened.

The load-bearing capability of the pack is provided by two aluminum stays, each 24″ in length. Hill People Gear claims that this length tends to be the sweet spot for providing adequate load lift for most torso lengths. The stays are constructed of 7075 aluminum, measuring 1″ wide and 1/8″ thick. They are shipped with a standard bend that will fit most people decently well, but Evan Hill (co-founder of Hill People Gear) is adamant that people must bend the stays to their own back to properly fit the Ute — so much so that the Ute is shipped with the stays removed from their pockets. The thinner aluminum of the stays makes bending them easier than bending stays from some other manufacturers. You can do it over your knee, which makes adjustment in the field simple. The particular aluminum of the stays also allows them to bend slightly when you hit the load lifters. This elasticity makes for a more comfortable pack than those supported by stiff stays. The process of bending the stays in demonstrated in Evan Hill’s video on fitting the Ute.

Harness

The Ute features the same shoulder harness as the previously reviewed Tarahumara. I am still in love with this harness, and try to avoid carrying any pack with standard shoulder straps. Rather than attaching to the Ute via two 1″ pieces of webbing on either side of the top of the harness, the Ute takes advantage of the large triglide in the center of the harness and attaches with a single 1.5″ piece of webbing.

The design of the harness along with this single central attachment point is one of the features that make the Ute unique when compared to other internal frame packs. In some ways the Ute can be thought of as more of an over-sized lumbar pack than a backpack. What this allows for is an exceptional degree of shoulder articulation. This is something which becomes valuable in activities other than just walking, such as climbing or skiing. I have found that this is a marked improvement over other packs that I’ve carried (even Kifaru packs with the Hill People Gear harness attached via the traditional dual 1″ webbing pieces) when scrambling on all fours up fields of talus. When you don’t want this extra movement, tightening the load lifters will bring the pack in closer to your back and make it carry more like a traditional backpack.

The 1.5″ piece of webbing that attaches the shoulder harness to the pack is sewn onto another piece of 1.5″ webbing that runs horizontally along the top of the pack. From there, the webbing travels down toward the lumbar region of the pack before running through two plastic looploc buckles and then traveling back upwards, where it is attached to the harness. The reason for running through two plastic looploc buckles rather than one is simply to make sure that the pack remains functional if one of the plastic buckles were to break.

Some users have reported that the thickness of the two buckles digs into their back. After properly bending the stays to the shape of my back, I have not experienced this issue, but I can see how it would be a problem if the Ute were used as a lightly loaded day pack without a belt. One of the plastic buckles can be cut off to mitigate this issue. If the remaining plastic buckle were to break, the pack could still be repaired in the field by repurposing the lower compression straps. Immediately to either side of where the plastic looploc buckles attach to the pack are two 1″ webbing tabs. The G-Hooks of the lower compression straps can be hooked into these tabs and then the ends of the straps attached to the harness in the traditional manner.

Prairie Belt

The Ute is the first pack to feature the Prairie Belt. The Prairie Belt is Hill People Gear’s version of the pack belt, but, as you might expect by now, is much more than just another pack belt. The name is a nod to the cartridge belts of old worn by the US Cavalry — a sort of proto battle belt. As this relation implies, the Prairie Belt is not just a pack belt, but is also designed to be worn separately.

The belt is available in three different sizes to best suit the user’s waist. The belt wings are each about 7″ tall and feature two rows of PALS webbing for accessory attachment. In addition to the PALS, each wing has various loops made of a US-made equivalent of Hypalon. These loops are used to attach the stabilizing delta straps when the belt is used with a pack, as well as for rigging up a basic safety harness with tubular webbing and for holding a climbing rack.

The belt is made of 1000 denier Cordura, except for the center lumbar area. Both the inside and outside of this area are made of the same Hypalon-like material, which gives the belt some grip against both the user’s back and against a pack. The outside also features two stay pockets made of the Hypalon-like material. Each of these are about 2″ tall and 3″ wide, allowing them to fit a variety of different pack stays.

Also on the outside of the center lumbar area are four webbing loops and a piece of paracord with a cord loc. When used in standalone mode, this allows the belt to carry something like a jacket or a Mountain Serape.

On the inside of each wing, near the center lumbar area, there is a Velcro closing that gives access to the belt’s padding. The Prairie Belt ships with two pieces of foam in each wing: a grey piece of 1/4″ thick closed-cell foam, and a black piece of 1/2″ foam. The black foam is some sort of pipe insulation foam and is much softer than the grey foam. Shipping the belt with these two pieces of foam, and making them accessible, gives the user the choice of adjusting the belt’s padding to their needs. The belt can be used with both pieces of foam, only one, or none at all. I have found that the grey foam is a bit too stiff for my tastes. When used with the Ute, I like to run the Prairie Belt with just the black foam.

Unfortunately, the black foam starts to laminate to the inner coating of the Prairie Belt’s Cordura when exposed to some heat. This has no effect on the performance of the foam when it is left alone inside the belt. It does make it difficult to remove the black foam from the belt after it has seen some use. This is disappointing if you expect to be able to adjust the padding over the lifetime of the belt (without frequent replacement of the foam).

In the center, the belt closes via 1.5″ webbing and a side-release buckle. The pack comes with a spare 1.5″ side-release buckle in case the belt buckle is broken. The buckle can also easily be replaced with a Cobra buckle for a heavier but more dependable option.

The webbing is not laced through the buckle as it normally would be to hold tension. Instead tension is held and adjusted at the ladderlocs on either side of the belt wings. To tighten the belt, each piece of webbing is pulled across the body. This makes the belt adjustment more similar to that found on Osprey belts than Kifaru’s.

To attach the Prairie Belt to the Ute, the stays are first inserted into the stay pockets on the belt. The Ute’s lumbar pad is then folded over the belt and attached via Velcro underneath the padded section of the Ute. I am somewhat skeptical of using Velcro in such a critical part of the pack. Velcro wears out over time, and attracts dirt and sand, which makes it less effective. I am more comfortable with Kifaru’s system of attaching the upper section of the lumbar pad with plastic and metal hardware.

The belt comes with 4 straps, each with a G-Hook on one end. These are used as the stabilizing delta straps. They attach to the Ute via ladderloc buckles (the buckles themselves are attached to the Ute bag via the Hypalon-like material). The G-Hooks of the upper straps are then attached to the Hypalon-like loops of the belt. There’s no attachment point on the belt specifically intended for the lower straps. Instead, the user can attach the G-Hooks of the lower straps to whatever column of PALS in the lower row best suits them.

This method of attaching the belt is widely used. As a result, the Prairie Belt can be used on packs with removable belts from many different manufacturers. As with the shoulder harness, I have found that throwing the Prairie Belt on other packs can make for a marked improvement. The belt carries very well on a pack, but perhaps more importantly, can also function as a standalone piece when you want to leave your pack at camp and venture off with just some water and a jacket.

Compression

The Ute features three horizontal compression straps around the body of the pack, along with two vertical straps on the bottom and two on the top. All of these straps are completely removable and replaceable.

The horizontal straps have a unique attachment system. Within the seam where either side panel attaches to the front panel, there are three webbing loops spaced along the height of the pack. Each compression strap attaches to one of these loops via a G-Hook. The straps are then routed along the length of the side panels, where they loop through a looploc buckle. The looploc buckles are attached to the pack via a piece of Hypalon-like material that runs along the entire height of the pack. From here, the straps run back along the side panels towards the front panel. Next to the G-Hook where the strap initially connected to the pack is another looploc buckle. The strap runs through that looploc buckle and then finally terminates in either a male or female half of a side-release buckle.

What this somewhat complex setup creates is a pulley system that makes for a superior compression setup. Evan Hill described the advantages gained by the pulley system setup as this:

• 2:1 mechanical advantage on tightening that strap
• having a single Side Release (SR) buckle in center allows the compression panel to be snugged all the way down to the frame with no excess play on either side. At 1.25″ wide, G-hooks are the narrowest attachment element available (other than slik clips which aren’t strong enough for this application). This means that total width of the whole system is compression panel width plus 2.5″. Most of our compression panels are 9″ wide. That means total width is 11.5″ wide. The Ute is 12″ wide. The Umlindi is 11″ wide. See what is going on there? You can completely suck the compression panel to the frame using this setup
• Same strap system protects the zipper that is found on most of our compression panels without extra rigging or anything
• Between SR buckle and G-hooks, you can completely undo compression strap without unthreading anything
• SR buckle, which can’t hold tension if it is on a corner, stays in the center where it holds tension well
• You can quickly throw stuff under the center straps, like snowshoes or a jacket.

Most multi-days packs on the market claim that they can be compressed for use with a day-pack sized load. The Ute is the first pack I’ve come across that actually delivers a compression system that can easily and adequately reduce the volume of the pack without resulting in bunched material or bulging between the straps.

The lower compression straps attach via G-Hooks and a metal 3-bar slider. On the original run of Utes, these straps were sized to compress the load of the pack, but were too short to allow a foam sleeping pad to be held underneath. This was quickly addressed. The straps are now sized appropriately to carry something like a Therm-a-Rest RidgeRest.

The two straps on the top attach to the front of the pack via a G-Hook and attach to the back via side-release buckles immediately above the top of the stay channels. The female portion of the side-release buckles are slotted so that they may be removed when the straps are not being used.

These straps are not so much used for compression as they are to provide overflow capacity. At about 30″ in length, they provide a lot of upward capacity. They can be used to secure something like a bedroll or food bag to the top of the pack. Due to the straps’ attachment locations at the top of the front panel and immediately above the stay channels, they do an excellent job of bringing the weight of these items into the pack. I’m usually a fan of packs with floating lids for the upward capacity that they provide, but the Ute’s top straps have convinced me that the floating lid is not the only solution to the problem of overflow capacity.

Lid

The Ute features a simple zippered lid. The beefy zipper is reinforced by the top compression straps so that if the zipper were to fail, the pack would still be functional.

The inside of the lid is covered with PALS: 3 rows and 6 columns. A zipper on the inside of the lid also provides access to a small internal pocket. I have yet to find a set of pouches that I like for the PALS grid, although I think the EDC Slimline Pouch will be a good contender. Inside the zippered pocket I tend to store a first aid kit, notebook, and maps.

Behind the lid is a port for a hydration hose. This opening is at the top of the pack, in the rear-center of the lid. As a result it happens to provide an excellent channel for water to enter the pack. This has not proved to be a problem so far, but it makes me uncomfortable. I would prefer it if the hole had some sort of covering, such that it could be more-or-less closed when not in use.

Weight

The pack and all of its components, including my size small belt with both pieces of foam, weigh in at exactly 5 pounds on my scale. That’s heavier than I like for a pack of this volume — I would prefer to not go over 4 pounds — but the features of the pack justify the weight. It’s certainly the best designed pack that I’ve ever carried, and the suspension system is comfortable enough that I’m happy to carry the Ute even when I have a similar-sized pack that’s half the weight of the Ute at home.

Perhaps the highest praise that I can give the Ute is this: after receiving the Ute I sold my Kifaru ZXR. The ZXR is the pack that I’ve had for the longest period of time. It’s an excellent pack and the one that I have carried on the vast majority of my adventures. I never thought that I would get rid of it, but the Ute is a superior pack and made the ZXR too redundant. For my applications, the Hill People Gear Ute is just about perfect. If I could only have one multi-day pack, this would be it.

An anonymous reader sends this news from Ars Technica: "Using online anonymity services such as Tor or sending encrypted e-mail and instant messages are grounds for U.S.-based communications to be retained by the National Security Agency, even when they're collected inadvertently, according to a secret government document published Thursday. ...The memos outline procedures NSA analysts must follow to ensure they stay within the mandate of minimizing data collected on U.S. citizens and residents. While the documents make clear that data collection and interception must cease immediately once it's determined a target is within the U.S., they still provide analysts with a fair amount of leeway. And that leeway seems to work to the disadvantage of people who take steps to protect their Internet communications from prying eyes. For instance, a person whose physical location is unknown—which more often than not is the case when someone uses anonymity software from the Tor Project—"will not be treated as a United States person, unless such person can be positively identified as such, or the nature or circumstances of the person's communications give rise to a reasonable belief that such person is a United States person," the secret document stated.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

I dreamed that that I was driving through a parking garage when my brakes suddenly failed. I tried executing turns to bleed off speed, but it was largely ineffective. I managed to avoid hitting a parked police car (which had arrived to investigate some other accident), but was unable to avoid another parked car.

An insurance adjuster who was on the scene for the first accident looked at my car and discovered that my primary brake pads were completely missing, so the calipers were grabbing air. And in my panic, it never occurred to me to use my left foot to push the button which hot-installs the secondary brake pads. (Yes, this makes no sense. It's a dream, remember?)

I tried to order replacement pads from Amazon.com, but it insisted on ordering them for the virtual car in my account rather than the actual car that had the accident.

Also, true dream fact: Brake pads are made of Styrofoam. ("Well, there's your problem.")

chicksdaddy writes "In the days since stories based on classified information leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden hit the headlines, a string of reports and editorials claim that he had his facts wrong, accuse him of treason – or both. Others have accused journalists like Glen Greenwald of The Guardian of rushing to print before they had all the facts. All of these criticisms could be valid. Technology firms may not have given intelligence agencies unfettered and unchecked access to their users' data. Edward Snowden may be, as the New York Times's David Brooks suggests, one of those 20-something-men leading a 'life unshaped by the mediating institutions of civil society.' All those critiques may be true without undermining the larger truth of Snowden's revelation: in an age of global, networked communications and interactions, we are all a lot less free than we thought we were. I say this because nobody has seriously challenged the basic truth of Snowden's leak: that many of the world's leading telecommunications and technology firms are regularly divulging information about their users' activities and communications to law enforcement and intelligence agencies based on warrantless requests and court reviews that are hidden from public scrutiny. It hasn't always been so." Bruce Schneier has published an opinion piece saying that while Snowden did break the law, we need to investigate the government before any prosecution occurs. (Schneier's piece is one in a series on the subject.) Snowden himself said in an interview today that the U.S. government has been pursuing hacking operations against China for years.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader writes "Student interns are typically relegated to menial tasks like fetching coffee and taking out the trash, the idea being that they get paid in experience instead of money. On Tuesday, Manhattan Federal District Court Judge William H. Pauley disagreed, ruling in favor of two interns who sued Fox Searchlight Pictures to be paid for their work on the 2010 film Black Swan. The interns did chores that otherwise would have been performed by paid employees. Pauley ruled, in accordance with criteria laid out by the U.S. Department of Labor, that unpaid internships should be educational in nature and specifically structured to the benefit of the intern, and reasoned that if interns are going to do grunt work like regular employees, then they should be paid like regular employees." The article seems to imply that this might be the beginning of the end for the rampant abuse of unpaid internships: "Judge Pauley rejected the argument made by many companies to adopt a 'primary benefit test' to determine whether an intern should be paid, specifically whether 'the internship’s benefits to the intern outweigh the benefits to the engaging entity.' Judge Pauley wrote that such a test would be too subjective and unpredictable."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader writes "While the tech media has gone wild the past few days with the reports of the NSA tracking Verizon cell usage and creating the PRISM system to peer into our online lives, a new study by Pew Research suggests that most U.S. citizens think it's okay. 62 percent of Americans say losing some personal privacy is acceptable as long as its used to fight terrorism, and 56 percent are okay with the NSA tracking phone calls. Online tracking is fair less popular however, with only 45 percent approving of the practice. The data also shows that the youth are far more opposed to curtailing privacy to fight terror, which could mean trouble for politicians planning to continue these programs in the coming years."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

cervesaebraciator writes "In the wake of recent revelations from Edward Snowden, apologists for the state security apparatus are predictably hitting the airwaves. Some are even 'glad' the NSA has been doing this. A major point they emphasize is that the content of calls have remained private and it is only the metadata that they're interested in. But given how much one can tell from interpersonal connections, does the surveillance only represent a 'modest encroachments on privacy?' It is easy enough to imagine how metadata on phone calls made to and from a medical specialist could be more revealing than we'd like. But social network analysis can reveal far more. Duke sociologist Kieran Healy, in a light-hearted but telling article, shows how one father of the American Revolution could have been identified using the simplest tools of social network analysis and only a limited dataset."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Shortly after the tragedy in Newton, CT last December a petition was started on Whitehouse.gov calling for a “Gun Free Zone” around the President and vice President.  Not just the typical run of the mill gun free zone but a completely gun free zone that would also prevent their security, including the Secret Service, from carrying firearms as well.

After all, if a gun free zone is good enough for our children, it should be good enough for our President…. right?

Not quite.  Apparently the White House feels that the lives of elected officials are more important the lives of children and while guns are necessary to protect one class of people, they can only kill our children.
Obviously I’m paraphrasing but the mantra speaks for itself in the official White House response.

“We live in a world where our elected leaders and representatives are subject to serious, persistent, and credible threats on a daily basis. Even those who are mere candidates in a national election become symbols of our country, which makes them potential targets for those seeking to do harm to the United States and its interests.”

So apparently guns can prevent an active shooter from succeeding and killing a politician but they won’t save our children from the very same would be murderer.  I say our children because theirs are protected by armed federal agents around the clock.  Even while at ‘gun free’ schools.

The lack of logic from the anti self-defense crowd is astounding, but at this point it shouldn’t be surprising.  While I seriously doubt anyone thought this petition would result in a “gun free zone” it does allow us yet another peek behind the crazy curtain of the anti-gunner.

Tim (MAC) has written several articles about why his caliber of choice is 9mm (The Fading 40  and Teats, Bulls and the .40 S&W).  In the past, I too have mentioned my move from .45 to 9mm, and why I have never been a fan of the .40SW.

Before we get too deep into this, we must first look at some very basics about how handgun bullets stop (kill) humans.  They either immediately incapacitate the target with a CNS (central nervous system) shot or they stop the target by causing them to bleed out.  Absent either of those, the attacker can still carry on their attack, even if they become slower or hindered by wounds.  The FBI report I look at later goes further into this, but that is how it works in a nutshell.

Recently, I attended an advanced handgun tactical training class, and at the beginning of the first day we watched a PowerPoint presentation put together by the rangemaster on my department.  It was an excellent presentation, and one in which he spent much time compiling and sorting information.  As I have mentioned before, he was a long time .45ACP carrier, just like me, who has since switched to 9mm based on the results of his research.  One of the sub-topics of that presentation was ammunition selection.  It was clearly stated at the onset of that topic, and anyone would be foolish to argue this point:

All other things being equal, the bigger the bullet the better

The problem with that caveat is that nothing else is equal.  No other “big boy” caliber handgun will carry as many rounds as a comparably sized 9mm and none of them are as easy to shoot as a 9mm.

History
To better understand why the .40SW became so popular, let us first look at why the 9mm fell out of favor.  One of the most noteworthy cases, and as far as the FBI is concerned, the precipitating event was the 1986 Miami-Dade Shootout between eight FBI agents and two well-armed bank robbers.  Two of the FBI agents were armed with shotguns, three with 9mm S&W semi-autos and the rest had S&W .357 revolvers.  Two of the FBI agents were killed and all but one of the survivors was injured.  The FBI’s investigation of this incident placed partial blame on the stopping power of the 9mm handguns carried by only three of the eight agents.  This prompted the FBI to look for a new cartridge, and a new standard gun as they also concluded that revolvers were no longer the best option for gun fighting.

In 1987, the FBI  held a Wound Ballistics Seminar from which a report was generated.  The forward from that report is well worth reading.

Forward

The selection of effective handgun ammunition for law enforcement is a critical and complex issue. It is critical because of that which is at stake when an officer is required to use his handgun to protect his own life or that of another. It is complex because of the target, a human being, is amazingly endurable and capable of sustaining phenomenal punishment while persisting in a determined course of action. The issue is made even more complex by the dearth of credible research and the wealth of uninformed opinion regarding what is commonly referred to as “stopping power.”

In reality, few people have conducted relevant research in this area, and fewer still have produced credible information that is useful for law enforcement agencies in making informed decisions.

This article brings together what is believed to be the most credible information regarding wound ballistics. It cuts through the haze and confusion, and provides common-sense, scientifically supportable, principles by which the effectiveness of law enforcement ammunition may be measured. It is written clearly and concisely. The content is credible and practical. The information contained in this article is not offered as the final word on wound ballistics. It is, however, an important contribution to what should be an ongoing discussion of this most important of issues.

John C. Hall
Unit Chief
Firearms Training Unit

The report listed four mechanics of projectile wounding: 1) Penetration, 2) Permanent Cavity, 3) Temporary Cavity and 4) Fragmentation.   It goes on to explain that fragmentation cannot be counted on with handgun rounds by saying “Fragmentation, on the other hand, does not reliably occur in handgun wounds due to the relatively low velocities of handgun bullets.”  Of the remaining three factors, they also discount the importance of the temporary cavity saying “temporary cavity is frequently, and grossly, overrated as a wounding factor when analyzing wounds.  Nevertheless, historically it has been used in some cases as the primary means of assessing the wounding effectiveness of bullets.”  That leaves us with two remaining causes for projectile wounding, penetration and permanent cavity.

Some other useful points that come from that report follow:
-  Except for CNS (central nervous system) hits, instant incapacitation is not possible with a handgun bullet
-  Even with the heart destroyed, voluntary action by the subject shot is still possible for 10-15 seconds
-  Organs are only damaged by a handgun with a direct hit
-  Temporary cavity caused by a handgun bullet has no effect
-  Kinetic energy deposit has no effect

The summary of that report does an excellent job putting it all in perspective.

Physiologically, no caliber or bullet is certain to incapacitate any individual unless the brain is hit. Psychologically, some individuals can be incapacitated by minor or small caliber wounds. Those individuals who are stimulated by fear, adrenaline, drugs, alcohol, and/or sheer will and survival determination may not be incapacitated even if mortally wounded.

The will to survive and to fight despite horrific damage to the body is commonplace on the battlefield, and on the street. Barring a hit to the brain, the only way to force incapacitation is to cause sufficient blood loss that the subject can no longer function, and that takes time. Even if the heart is instantly destroyed, there is sufficient oxygen in the brain to support full and complete voluntary action for 10-15 seconds.

Kinetic energy does not wound. Temporary cavity does not wound. The much discussed “shock” of bullet impact is a fable and “knock down” power is a myth. The critical element is penetration. The bullet must pass through the large, blood bearing organs and be of sufficient diameter to promote rapid bleeding. Penetration less than 12 inches is too little, and, in the words of two of the participants in the 1987 Wound Ballistics Workshop, “too little penetration will get you killed.”  Given desirable and reliable penetration, the only way to increase bullet effectiveness is to increase the severity of the wound by increasing the size of hole made by the bullet. Any bullet which will not penetrate through vital organs from less than optimal angles is not acceptable. Of those that will penetrate, the edge is always with the bigger bullet.

Where They Went From There
Now, let’s examine what they had to work with in 1987 when this report was generated.  The 9mm ammunition of the day did only one of those two desired things (penetration and permanent wound cavity) well.  They either penetrated very well, as in the case of 9mm ball ammo, or they had large, but short, permanent wound cavities.  Most of the hollow point rounds from that era rapidly expanded causing a larger diameter cavity, but they stopped very rapidly and fell far short of what the FBI determined was to be the minimal effective penetration depth of 12 inches.  Based on the poor performance of the 9mm ammo available, they looked to other calibers.

Initially, in 1988, the FBI adopted the 10mm, but the very sharp recoil of that cartridge lead them to develop a lighter load, referred to as the “10mm FBI” load.  S&W took that lighter load and shrunk the case in length allowing it to fit in the same sized action as a 9mm, thus creating the .40SW which debuted in 1990.

In 1993, the FBI conducted a second Wound Ballistics Seminar which essentially validated everything they learned in the first one.  They also noted that it is impossible to predict how a human will react to being shot, and that shot placement is critical and is dependent on good training.  They stressed that the only thing an officer (shooter) can depend on to produce rapid, reliable incapacitation with a handgun is the infliction of trauma so severe as to totally disrupt the central nervous system.  Finally, due to the nature of both the makeup of the human body and the effect that clothing and other barriers can have on the bullet as it impacts people in the real world, expansion should never be the basis for bullet selection, but should only be considered a bonus if and when it occurs.

In 1994, the Clinton gun ban went into effect.  The firearms manufacturers had all seen it coming and that was when they began to really push the .40SW guns, especially on law enforcement.  Not only did they want to get back as many of the pre-ban 9mm guns and magazines as they could to resell to the public, but now since they could no longer produce “high-capacity” magazines for the public, they pushed the new caliber guns since both guns would be limited to 10 rounds, and thus was born the era of the .40SW.

Fast-forward 20 years.  Many of the reasons for moving away from the 9mm are no longer applicable.  Modern bullet design not only achieves excellent penetration, but also allows for excellent expansion (when the stars align and it actually expands).   Since as it is stated in the FBI reports, the kinetic force exerted upon impact is irrelevant (one argument for larger diameter and heavier bullets) and in the realm of handgun rounds, there really is no such thing as “knock down power” (another argument for larger diameter and heavier bullets), and even back in 1987, the temporary wound cavity was discounted as insignificant, some of the arguments for a larger caliber start to fall apart.

Let the Argument for 9mm Begin
When considering all of the information provided in that FBI reports, combined with the advances in modern handgun ammunition, I began to look at caliber choice in a new way, with much thanks to my aforementioned rangemaster.

Argument 1
For argument sake, let us say we are in a gun fight and since we cannot count on expansion or CNS hits, we are left with exsanguination as the only reliable means of stopping our foe.  Now let’s take the same handgun in either .40SW or 9mm.  For this argument, I will assume we are using a Sig P226 since I am quite familiar with them.  Now, in our gunfight, we fire every round in our gun, and by some miracle, all of our rounds strike our target in the torso.  I ask you, which will cause our foe to bleed out faster, the 12 10mm holes (.40SW is the 10mm in diameter) or 15 9mm holes?

Argument 2
Given the same training and trigger time, the average shooter can put more rounds on target in a shorter period of time with a 9mm than with a .40SW.  This comes down to pure physics.  The .40SW is a harder kicking, sharper recoiling round than the 9mm.  I would argue that even those who prefer .40SW, if firing the same platform in both calibers, they would be hard pressed to shoot their preferred .40SW as quickly and accurately as they could with a 9mm.

Argument 3
Given the same platform firearm (as in the case of the Sig P226), the same platform can hold more 9mm rounds than it can in .40SW.  More bullets is always a good thing in a gun fight.

Argument 4
When comparing the duty ammo that my department carries (Federal HST 147 grain 9mm and 180 grain .40SW), the 9mm rounds actually outperform the .40SW rounds for penetration in ballistics gelatin.  I actually witnessed this first hand last week in the advanced handgun class I attended.  Considering one of the two primary wounding characteristics is penetration depth, this is another win for the 9mm.

Argument 5
The difference in diameter between the two rounds is only 1mm.  Even if you assume absolutely zero expansion, that is an extremely minimal difference in size between two holes from which the intended goal is to have blood leak.

Summary
As we have said in the past, caliber choice like many things in the gun world is a personal decision.  I personally have no stake in what you carry or shoot.  I am only offering this information as it is what finally caused me to switch from my venerable, loved, tough and manly .45ACP all the way down to the sissy, girlie-man 9mm.  Just consider this food for thought.

As always, your questions and comments are welcome.
Be safe out there,
Matt

The recent, widely publicized U.S. terror intelligence — which, among other things, speculated upon two new methods by which to potentially be killed by Al-Qaeda on an airplane, including a “Clothes Bomber” and “Frankenbomber” — has led to further speculation about the possibility of death being caused by the speculation itself.

“Heck, I don’t know if me or my family are going to be killed by an Un-American Apparel Bomber or Frankenbomber,” said William Bledsoe of Tullahoma, Tennessee, “But I do know that I laughed so danged hard when I heard that radio announcement that I nearly drove my truck off the road.”

Amid the flurry of satirical commentary on Twitter under the hashtags #Un-AmericanApparelBomber and #Frankenbomber has come very real concerns that such announcements by U.S. intelligence officials may be causing Americans to become distracted while partaking of actual, everyday dangerous activities, such as eating, walking, and pulling out of their driveways.

“I would say that last week’s announcement of intelligence on a potential Fashionbomber and Frankenbomber caused at least 3-6 people to veer off the road and die horrible deaths,” said David Milbrook, president of the American Traffic Safety Services Association.

29-year-old Amy Yu of Portland, Oregon claims that the ABC News recap of the possibility of a future Frankenbomber nearly led to her demise.

“My boyfriend and I were enjoying a nice dinner of braised balsamic chicken when the news report came on ABC News, about the terrorists who may be out there planning to dip their clothes in liquid explosives and let them dry, turning their outfits into fashion bombs and all. When the part about the possibility of a ‘Frankenbomber’ with a surgically-implanted bomb destroying an airplane came on, my boyfriend got up from the table and started doing a Frankenstein imitation, arms out, sort of stumbling around the living room.”

“He was all, ‘Urrgh, urrgh, look at me, I’m Khalid-Mohammed al-Frankenbomber, I’m going to kill you the next time you fly on an airplane, Amy.’ He looked really ridiculous, and it was funny, because you know, it’s not like I’m ever actually going to be killed by a Frankenbomber. But it made me laugh so hard that I choked on a piece of chicken, which almost did kill me. Luckily, my boyfriend knows the Heimlich maneuver,” said Yu.

“Braised balsamic chicken is supposed to be really healthful, but when you add U.S. intelligence to it, it can turn into death chicken,” added Yu. “I just think people need to be aware of that.”

—-

Combatives is a term that’s currently being thrown around like the word tactical was in the 90’s. So, let’s start by defining combatives; what does it really mean?

It’s an object driven concept where range, weaponry and timing are all interconnected in order to achieve a specific outcome. For example, finding yourself in such close proximity that your primary weaponry are no longer available, or so surprised that you’re unable to employ traditional methods. Knowing how to fight with your rifle in a less-lethal role during situations that don’t meet your force continuum, or lethal force training, also apply here.

Another way to look at it is if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. A lot of folks try to define it as either being offensive or defensive, but what we’re really talking about is something that’s literally both.

The Early Days

My exposure to combatives goes back to my early Navy days, when we were in the beginning stages of developing our combatives program. I was very lucky to see it evolve over the years and quite proud of the success. In the beginning, my mindset was strictly offensive, I really didn’t give much thought the defensive side.

The work that’s put into developing the proper mindset cannot be ignored. It really is a defining principle; not just lip service, but an integral part. The example I use is one that was taught to me, “you’re about to make entry through this door, on the other side lies pure evil. It is within arms reach, knows you are coming and is stronger and meaner than you. Ready, set; go!”

To mentally prepare for this altercation required winning the fight before I stepped into the room and that was done through fear management. One of the best in the business when it comes to understanding fear management, is my good friend Tony Blauer.

Fear Management

The way Tony dissects the concept so that you can understand the core issue is amazing. While I didn’t know him back then, the principle we used was similar. For me, it was my fear was of letting my teammates down or failing the mission. Once I understood that, it completely altered the landscape.

I expected a battle beyond every doorway and to prepare for it, I hit the door with a level of aggression that would describe as a racecar engine in the red. My engine was revved up and I was ready to fight and exploit everything at my disposal to be victorious. Then, if it was determined that level of aggression wasn’t necessary for whatever reason, it tapered off to normal. The advantages to this mindset were pretty simple, action versus reaction.

Looking at Range

While you may already be familiar with range, or distance, here’s how we look at it. Contact Range, Danger Close and Close Range. Contact Range is the most dangerous, because you’re already within contact or can easily happen; think of bad breath distance. If you can smell it, you’re probably in it.

Danger Close would require quick and sudden movement to be within Contact Range, but your opponent would have to do something first. Close Range buys you just a little amount of time, as they’re well outside Danger Close. As you move through your everyday life, you move through all these ranges with those around you. The ebb and flow is constant, as we’re all social creatures. You can’t have a system that doesn’t anticipate range.

Tools, Weaponry and the High Ready

Starting from Contact Range, you have empty hands, contact weapons (knives & sticks) and ballistics weapons (firearms that launch their projectile). One of the problems I currently see, is not realizing that ballistic weapons can be used as contact weapons. While they’re probably not the best contact weapons; the situation, range or timing could put you in a position where your best option is to use them as a contact weapon. Believe me, it works!

This leads us to a specific point I’d like to make, which has to do with the use of what we call the High Ready. This is a weapons posture that places the firearm at an upward angle, versus a downward angle like the Low Ready. Folks are quick to badmouth it, but I am always leery if they haven’t employed it operationally. This ready position epitomizes everything that I’ve talked about up to this point, but more importantly, it addresses a very serious oversight we see throughout the industry. That oversight is in dealing with unknowns.

Battling the Unknowns

People are quick to talk about shoot threats and no-shoot threats, but there’s a grey area in between there that’s referred to as the unknown. For whatever reason, these are not clear shoot-threats or clear no-­shoot threats, hence the unknown status. Things get even more complicated when the unknown is non-compliant. It’s pretty easy if they’re compliant and obey all commands on the spot, but what do you do when they’re non-compliant and not yet a clear shoot-threat? How do you deal with them? You can’t let your guard down and you can’t “tune them up” just on general purpose.

The first thing to mention with regard to the High Ready, is it gives you options; you have lethal force, hard contact (weapon strikes) and soft contact (empty hand) all at the ready. The posture allows the situation to dictate and literally zero hesitation in application.

If the situation calls for lethal force, the firearm extends to the normal mount for shots fired. If the situation has de-escalated but force is still necessary, the use of hard contact (muzzle strikes, muzzle slaps or 3-­points pushes) is available. Lastly, if the situation has de-­escalated further, but force is still necessary, the use of soft contact (palm blasts, palm strikes and forearms) is on standby.

Not only do you get the offensive side as described, but you also get the defensive side. You’re placing a hard object between the bad guy and your head/brain. How many hits to the head can you sustain and still be combat effective? Imagine stepping into a boxing ring. Where do you want your hands, above the waist or below your waist? The bottom line is how will you protect yourself as you go through the door? As long as you maintain good position and posture; elbows outside 90°, sights level with chin and wrists locked, you’re good to go. It doesn’t take much practice and it’s extremely effective. This is part of the reason it’s been our default ready position for over 20 years.

Flash vs. Boiling

All fights are different, but some have common factors. We break them down into two types; flash and boiling. A flash happens just as described; you’re surprised. Boiling has cues that if observed, can allow you to avoid, deter or de-­escalate. Let’s concentrate on the flash type scenario, since this is the most dangerous.

I would be remiss if I didn’t at least leave you with a formula for avoidance of a flash event. This formula is ODEX (observe, decide and execute.) Be familiar with your surroundings and the situation; have a short list of options for your decision-­making and then execute swiftly, aggressively and without hesitation. So, if you can’t pick up on the pre-­fight cues, then you must counter quickly with the sole intention of gaining superior position and superior weaponry.

The tools you use to reach the objective vary. They could be some I’ve described earlier, or other system and schools of thought. One of my favorites, I again credit to Tony Blauer, “Closest Weapon/Closet Target.” Understand what you have available, then understand targeting. The point is to keep your objective in mind; superior position/superior weaponry. When it’s go time, you should be prepared to unleash a full arsenal of controlled violence. Additionally, be prepared for injury and focus on the objective. Always work to improve your position (or weaponry) in whatever way possible until the situation is contained, or you’re no longer able to fight.

The key to combatives is realizing that it doesn’t depend on a single idea, such as empty hands. It’s the totality of your fighting ability to include range, tools and timing. It’s the understanding that not only do you have the ability to fight, but the will to fight in order to achieve your objective. The High Ready is a great position to exploit these concepts and it’s been used countless times successfully. In the end, it’s the mindset, preparation and willingness to act that really defines combatives.

Editor-in-Chief’s Note: Please join us in welcoming Jeff Gonzales as a contributor on ITS Tactical. Jeff was a decorated and respected US Navy SEAL, serving as an operator and trainer who participated in numerous combat operations throughout the world. He now uses his modern warfare expertise as President of Trident Concepts, LLC., a battle proven company specializing  in weapons, tactics and techniques to meet the evolving threat. Bringing the same high-intensity mindset, operational success and lessons learned from NSW to their training programs, TRICON has been recognized as an industry leader by various federal, state and local units. Organizations interested in training with TRICON can call 928-925-7038 or visit www.tridentconcepts.com for more information.

3x magnifiers for use with red dot sights have been with us for quite a few years now. The concept is that you can use your non-magnified red dot sight for rapid close range engagements, then flip a 3x magnifier in place to quickly engage targets that might be further out or require a more precise shot.

Despite their advantages, there are a couple of downsides to using a 3x magnifier. First is the price. Magnifiers offered by big name companies such as EOTech can set you back $500 or more. Couple that expense with the cost of the red dot sight itself and now you’re touching $1k for a sighting system.

The second issue I have with 3x magnifiers is that when combined with a red dot sight the entire setup is heavy and long. I’ve found they alter the balance of every rifle I’ve tried them on and not in a positive way. While there’s little you can do about the weight and length of the system, Vortex has been able to effectively address the first issue — price.

I’ve been using a new VMX-3T magnifier from Vortex Optics for a few weeks now, and it’s certainly a high quality piece of equipment. Not only is it well made and offers crystal clear optics, but it’s also available for $229 from our friends at 3 Rivers Precision. This price includes the flip-aside mount which makes the price even more attractive.

The VMX-3T isn’t Vortex’s first entry into magnifier market. The original VMX3 (now discontinued) was a decent quality optic however it featured a large protective rubber sleeve that covered 1/2 of the body and made using a fold-down rear back-up sight nearly impossible. The new VMX-3T does away with this unsightly hunk of rubber and thus gives ample room for a back-up sight to sit comfortably in the folded position below it.

The VMX-3T is 4.3″ long, has a 30mm tube  and tips the scale at 11.9oz. These specs are very similar to competitive magnifiers such as the EOTech G33. The VMX-3T has an eye relief of 3.25″ which is a full inch longer than the G33. This is a benefit if you plan on using the 3x magnifier on a rifle chambered in a caliber larger than 5.56/.223. Getting your face within 2″ of an optic mounted to a .308 could result in a painful, yet potentially stylish, dotted eye.

The VMX-3T works great with an EOTech sight which features a fine 1MOA center dot. When looking through the magnifier the EOTech’s reticle looks sharp and easily contrasts against most targets. The same is true with a RDS such as the Aimpoint Comp M2 or T1-Micro, however the dots aren’t as fine or sharp as the EOTech’s. Of course the magnifier will also work with Vortex RDS’s like the StrikeFire or SPARC. To assure a clear sight picture, the VMX-3T has a focus ring on the ocular lens for fine adjustment to the users vision. 

When you mount the VMX-3T to your rifle you will need to center your red dot sights’ reticle in the magnifier.  This is easily accomplished by looking through the magnifier while turning the two adjustment screws which resemble elevation and windage adjustment knobs on a conventional scope.

The included flip mount allows you to quickly and easily flip the magnifier to the side so you can use the red dot sight without magnification. To accomplish this, all that’s required is to press a large button with your thumb and push it aside. The downside to the mounts design is that it leaves the magnifier sitting off to the side of the rifle in something of a precarious position. If you’re a right handed shooter the location of the flipped-aside magnifier will block your peripheral vision which is what I find most troublesome. You could reverse the mount so that the magnifier flipped to the right, however this would place the release button in front of the sight which isn’t an ideal location for easy use.

While the VMX-3T has a standard 30mm tube, it has an integrated mount that doesn’t use a conventional 30mm ring to attach it the base. This may be a concern for some users who might want to use a 3rd party mount vs. the factory supplied mount.

Overall I’m impressed with the quality and functionality of the magnifier, it’s a very nice unit. The biggest issue I have is with the flip-aside mount that ships with the optic. I would prefer a twist type mount that swings the magnifier around and parks it next to the red dot sight. However, this isn’t a major issue though as I’m not all that fond of the twist mounts either. As a matter of fact, I’ve never used any flip-mount I was all that fond of. It’s one of the general shortcomings of using a 3x magnifier.

The price is what I find really attractive about the VMX-3T. I would have a hard time buying a more expensive unit given the quality and utility of the Vortex magnifier.

 

 

This week, crime statistics out of Virginia, collected from estimates obtained by the Richmond Times-Dispatch and Virginia State Police data, have provided yet more evidence disproving the anti-gun theory that a direct correlation exists between the number of guns in a community and the amount of firearms-related crime in that region. The data presented here, which will go unreported by the anti-gun biased media outlets reveal that, over the past year, Virginia has experienced an increase in firearms sales, while firearms related violent crime has, in fact, decreased (check out the telling infographic pictured left to see just how much that’s true). Let’s take a quick look at the data and address the common anti-gun response to these facts.

This past year (2012), firearms sales in Virginia hit a record high – 490,119 guns sold through licensed gun dealers – a 16% increase from the year prior. Meanwhile, violent firearm-related crime in Virginia has dropped 5% to 4,378 major firearms-related crimes in 2012. The logical question to consider is, with so many legally acquired additional firearms in circulation, why hasn’t Virginia’s violent firearms-related crime rate sky rocketed?

One response from the anti-gun crowd is predictable; I’ve heard it more than once when presenting (in vain) similar data to an anti-gun liberal. Their practiced mantra is something along these lines: “All of those guns are being purchased by gun nuts who have a house full of guns. Those guns are not on the street.” Unfortunately for them, those talking points actually reinforce the pro-gun argument. The data, and their assertion, both point to a simple truth: an increase in legally acquired firearms by law abiding citizens does not equate to an increase in firearms-related crime. On the contrary, as the data reflects, it has the opposite effect.

The message to legislators is that it’s not enough to produce ideology-based legislation that “feels good.” We need to know it actually works. That means applying an analytic eye to the case study evidence that already exists. Cases such as the declining violent firearm-related crime rate coinciding with a marked increase in firearms purchases in Virginia provide evidence that counters the ideology of “gun control.” Simply put, more guns ≠ more crime.

Featured image composed from photo courtesy of precisionsafeandlock.com.

It’s been quite awhile since we reviewed Hollow Spy Coins, Dead Drop Spikes and Hollow Spy Bolts here on ITS. Today we’re excited to announce that we’re now carrying these items here in the ITS Store!

Hollow Half Dollar Spy Coin

During the Cold War, spies used hollow coins to pass secret messages, hide suicide poisons and smuggle microfilms without detection. While we don’t expect you to use this for anything like that, being discreet with personal information is just one of the many uses for these Hollow Half Dollars.

By using one of the two included machined unlocking rings, a simple slam on the table is all it takes to open the two halves of the coin. The interior reveals a recessed area that perfectly fits a MicroSD Card! (not included)

The second ring is perfect to give to a counterpart if you need to trade information back and forth with the Hollow Half Dollar. While a bit more normal looking than our Spy Coins Edition ITS Challenge Coin, it’s still larger than most pocket change. Just be careful not to spend it!

Dead Drop Spike

A Dead Drop is simply an agreed upon spot where you and your contact can leave a message for one another without actually meeting in person. They’re typically used in conjunction with a “Signpost,” or a place where a signal is left which conveys the drop has been loaded.

The Dead Drop Spike is what’s referred to as a Covert Dead Drop, which would be concealed from the everyday line of sight. Machined from a solid billet of 3/4″ diameter aluminum, the Dead Drop Spike features a threaded top and o-ring seal to keep the contents waterproof. It can be pressed into soft ground to later be picked up, using the leather pull handle to aid in recovery.

Hollow Spy Bolt

The Hollow Spy Bolt is what’s referred to as an Overt Dead Drop, which would be disguised as an everyday item that could be left in plain sight. The hope is that no one would give it a second though if it was properly placed in its environment. With a simple counter-clockwise twist, the bolt head opens to reveal a hollow compartment.

Listen to this Post By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com All photo content contained in this article was shot by DefenseReview.com, and is copyrighted. DefenseReview.com owns the copyright on all photo content. All DR photos were shot with a Sony Cyber-shot RX100 (DSC-RX100/B) Digital Camera with 20.2 MP (20.2-megapixel) still camera and 1080p HD video camera ...