The One Rifle

November 20, 2008
12:00 PM CST

Let’s assume that you could own only one new hunting rifle—and to make life simpler, assume that we live in some Utopian paradise where foreign invasion is unlikely, crime is a non-issue and government oppression is impossible. Ignore all that stuff: we’re talking hunting.

In other words, if you could own only one bolt-action hunting rifle, which one would you pick?

Let’s make the definition even tighter, and take away all high-end custom rifles, and keep it to rifles which cost less than, say, $750. And furthermore, to eliminate the scope issue, let’s assume that some kind soul gave you for your birthday the fantastic Swarovski Z6 2-12x50mm, which, I respectfully suggest, would handle all your hunting needs, forever.

What you’re looking for, then, is a rifle with an excellent trigger and with outstanding accuracy, out of the box. (In any bolt-action rifle, the trigger is the most important feature, followed closely by barrel quality.)

I would also respectfully suggest that two, and only two rifles would qualify under the above criteria, and serve you well: the CZ 550 or Savage 10/110 (or the variants of either, which we’ll look at in a moment).

Both rifles, out of the box, are wonderfully accurate. Both represent the absolute best bargain for the money you can get. And both have excellent triggers: the CZ has a single-set trigger, which means that you can pull it in regular fashion, or else first push it forward, which “sets” it to a very light 1-lb pull. The Savage has its own Accu-Trigger, which enables you to set the trigger to your favorite pull weight—albeit an exercise which cannot be done on the fly.

Neither is a bad option; both are highly desirable features. I would accept either rifle in a heartbeat, and never feel short-changed.

I know that some people are going to ask about the Remington 700, which is also a decent rifle. My only quibble with the 700 is its trigger. It’s not a set trigger like the CZ’s, nor can it be easily adjusted by the shooter, like the Savage’s Accu-Trigger—unless you’re a seasoned rifle “tinkerer”, working on any rifle’s trigger is not recommended.

Myself, I prefer the CZ 550—and the reason for that is that CZ offers me more “furniture” options than Savage (I’m not interested in plastic stocks, of course). Both Savage and CZ offer a laminate stock, which is not a bad option. Here’s my ideal bolt-action CZ 550 configuration:

...and I love the full-length Mannlicher-style stock with a passion.

I know that the “hogsback” stock is not to everyone’s liking, but it is to mine (and CZ offers an “American” 550 with a straight stock). I prefer it greatly over the “Monte Carlo"-style stock offered by Savage:

All that said, I would take either rifle into the field in a heartbeat, and without a single qualm. Both have proven designs, and neither will ever let you down. Here, to my mind, is the essential difference between the two rifles.

The CZ 550 is a work of art, and its single-set trigger gives you some flexibility in the field.

The Savage 10/110 is more workmanlike, and the Accu-Trigger allows you to set it up so that the pull is exactly the same, each and every squeeze of the trigger.

Note that I’ve left off any discussion of caliber in the above discussion, because, frankly, that’s the least of your concerns: you’ll pick a caliber which suits your hunting needs, your ballistic preference, and your own “fondness”.

The CZ 550 is available in: .22-250 Rem, .243 Win, 6.5x55mm Swede, .270 Win, .308 Win, .30-06 Spgfld and 9.3x62mm. (Some restrictions apply, e.g. the FS version doesn’t come in .22-250, and the laminate stock only comes with their Varmint version.)

The Savage Model 10GXP (in its GXP version, as pictured above) is available in: .223 Rem, .22-250 Rem, .243 Win, 7mm-08 Rem, .308 Win, .270 WSM, 7mm WSM, and .300 WSM. (A different model number will get you a different selection of calibers, without sacrificing any of the Savage qualities. An example would be the Savage Model 110 GXP: .25-06 Rem, .270 Win, .30-06 Spgfld, 7mm Rem. Mag. and .300 Win Mag. The difference is the “short” action of the Mod 10 over the “long” action of the 110. They are, however, to all intents and purposes, the same rifle.)

Needless to say, because we’re talking about only one rifle, the next (and most vexing) question would be: which chambering? Which cartridge could you depend on to “do it all”—recognizing that with compromise comes shortcomings—and which would do, in summary, the best job regardless of quarry?

Of course, Longtime Readers will know that my preference would be for the 6.5x55mm Swede, to my mind the greatest “medium” cartridge ever made—but I would happily accept, if a Savage were thrust into my hands, either the .25-06 or the .270 Win.

My preference, by the way, is for a mildly-recoiling, flat-shooting cartridge which gives excellent penetration, which is why the 6.5x55mm Swede gets the nod over, say, the .308 Win or .30-06 (neither of which, let me quickly add, are slouches in the hunting business).

But that, as I’ve said before, is absolutely a matter of personal choice. Not one of the above chamberings would be a “wrong” choice, and neither of the two rifles would be a disgrace, either.

Man, how I love this shooting business, this Gun Thing…

Roost, Chickens Coming Home To, Part II

November 20, 2008
10:47 AM CST

Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of socialists.

The financial-market implosion and the coming transformation of the securities industry will expose the fundamental flaw in New York State’s woefully overextended public finance model. The state budget is today geared to run on an ever-expanding stream of high-octane revenues from a Wall Street that no longer exists—and the rest of New York’s economy isn’t nearly robust enough to make up the difference.

So… how is New York state government going to address this? Silly rabbits:

[NYGov] Paterson and the legislature will try to muddle through the coming year with a combination of minimal spending restraint, debt-based fiscal gimmickry, fee hikes, and—worst of all—tax increases, in a state already struggling under one of the heaviest tax burdens in the country.

Yeah… that’ll work.

Here’s my prediction: Economics 1, Socialists 0. As always.

It will be interesting viewing, if you’re the kind of person who enjoys watching those YouTube videos of pythons swallowing pigs.

Conservative Viewpoints

November 20, 2008
10:15 AM CST

By the way, for those who seek to find a decent daily overview of conservative perspective (and are sick of the usual suspects), let me recommend Richard Viguerie’s Conservative HQ.

Viguerie’s name, of course, is well known to conservatives, and his linkage is consistently excellent.

Likewise, American Thinker has thoughtful conservative content, and no definition of “thoughtful” could fail to include City Journal, quite easily the best magazine in America.

If you don’t have those in your Favorites folder, add them now. And feel free to add your suggestions in Comments.

The Way Back

November 20, 2008
8:48 AM CST

From SCGov Mark Sanford:

“Some on the left will say our electoral losses are a repudiation of our principles of lower taxes, smaller government and individual liberty. But [Election Day 2008] was not in fact a rejection of those principles—it was a rejection of Republicans’ failure to live up to those principles.” [my emphasis]

In looking at the WSJ’s assessment of the three Republican front-runners for party leadership, I’m struck by a couple of thoughts.

I don’t know much about Mark Sanford (and my SC Readers may feel free to enlighten me), but from what I’ve seen of him, he’s got the right stuff. Certainly, the privatization of South Carolina’s state pension program is a worthy achievement.

I don’t mind Sarah Palin as much as others (for example, The Mrs.) might. I think that she was absolutely the most qualified candidate for President, of the four offerings in this past election—but that doesn’t mean much, because Urkel is a vacuous blowhard with slight credentials and no executive capability (and are we ever going to find that out in the next few years), McCain is an erratic, unpredictable man with, likewise, no executive experience, and Biden is all the above, except he’s also dishonest to a fault.

But I also know that Palin is a big fish in an extremely small pond—and I mean no disprespect to Alaska or Alaskans—but I have to wonder whether she would have risen as far as she did had she been a resident of a larger state like, say, Colorado or Texas. Somehow, I doubt it, and therein lie my misgivings about her. But, as with Sanford, her conservatism is not jarring, other than perhaps that teeny bit of discomfort with her strong religious principles. Certainly, she is a better candidate than Mike Huckabee, if we’re going to talk religious conservatives, because unlike Palin, Huckabee is really an old-style Southern Democrat.

Which brings us, finally, to LAGov Bobby Jindal. Of all the candidates, Jindal has a towering intellect—truly, his IQ is off the charts by comparison to any senior politician in living memory—and his record is already impressive, his conservative credentials beyond reproach. Most of all, his no-nonsense attitude towards business and the economy is highly impressive, and I cannot help but think that he, and not McCain (and certainly not Urkel) would have been able to find a way to alleviate our current financial recession.

A slight aside: none of the 2008 candidates had (or have) a clue about how to handle a recession, by the way: all had that “deer in the headlights” look, because they were either economic ignoramuses (McCain), lawyer-politicians (Urkel and Biden) or woefully inexperienced in that area (all, including Palin, whose governorship was made easier by booming oil revenues and a hardly-populous state). It’s instructive to see that Urkel is planning an FDR-style interventionist policy to deal with the recession, even though it’s obvious that FDR’s actions were completely wrong and actually prolonged the Depression of the 1930s. I have no idea what McCain would have done about the recession—he’d fired Phil Gramm from his campaign for some nonsensical and trivial reason, and Gramm was the only man there, of either of the campaigns, who might have had a clue—and McCain’s unpredictability and recklessness would have done us no favors, either.

I have no doubts that any solution set from Jindal would be crafted from wisdom coupled with conservative principle. Sadly, he was too young for 2008—the U.S. presidency is not really a job for a wunderkind—but I have no doubt that he would be the right choice, so far, to lead the Stupid Party out of the swamp of its own, well, stupidity and become a decent governing party again, instead of the hopelessly-muddled bunch of fools, knaves and poltroons that comprise its current state.

But it’s early days, yet, and I’m loath to hitch my hopes to anyone. I am, however, determined that whatever the future holds, that future is best entrusted to the bedrock principles of this republic: limited government, ordered liberty of the people, and the free market of capitalism.

Whichever candidate can best execute and support those principles will have my vote.

Quote Of The Day

November 20, 2008
7:55 AM CST

In talking about the alliance between libertarians and social conservatives come these words of wisdom:

“America is not about unfettered freedom. America is about a particular type of liberty that has been the glory of the Western heritage, ordered liberty. Freedom without a strong moral basis ends up being an empty promise.”

I’ve always said that the common ground that exists between what I call “commonsense libertarianism” and conservatism is the desire for limited government.

But that’s a broad statement, and the devil is in the details. Libertarians argue that government has no role in social/moral policy, whereas conservatives feel, as the author of the above put it, that ”Man-made law… should seek to be in accord to some degree with divine and natural law.”

Indeed, not to feel that way is the common ground between libertarians and socialists, although even there, the devil is in the details: libertarians want to leave morality to the individual, while socialists want the State, and its laws and regulations, to be the supreme moral arbiter.

I have often said that libertarians can form the conscience of conservatism—that, ultimately, the desire for “hardly any” government is a handy brake on the desire of many conservatives for “a little too much” government.

The conclusion of all this is that the three points of the political triangle (libertarianism, conservatism and socialism) are all held hostage by their relative extremes: the anarchists, ultra-religious and totalitarians, respectively. I find little to choose, and much to dislike, between anarchists, the Religious Right and MoveOn.org (albeit for different reasons in each case). All are extremists, all make me uncomfortable, and all offer solutions which, ultimately, are either unworkable or whose outcomes are destined to cause massive misery.

And finally, I am convinced that if we accept the compromises inherent in the phrase “ordered liberty” and eschew the temptation to be selfish brats, religious nutcases and statist goons, I cannot help but feel that there is still hope for this noble republic.

But even there, the devils are in the details.

Guilty As Charged

November 20, 2008
6:15 AM CST

Okay, I admit to this crime. From Scaryduck:

Tit window: The opportunity, in any conversation or meeting with a young lady, to stare at her breasts whilst she is distracted by other matters. An art form that can be both challenging and rewarding.

I wish I could say that I could do something about this—and in work settings, I have to make a Supreme Effort—but generally, I can’t. If a woman has any kind of decent superstructure, my eyes are drawn thither as though by some ancient, magnetic force.

At this point, my Lady Readers may all forsake me in a huff, and I probably deserve their censure. But, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, allow me to say that I still occasionally catch myself, like Scary, glancing at my own wife’s superstructure: and we’ve been together for a dozen years.

I dunno. Some people are going to say (not in exculpation, but in explanation) that my fascination for bodacious tatas stems from my early adolescence, which, as it happens took place in the 1960s, at the precise moment when women decided that they were going to Burn Their Bras And Let It All Hang Out, Baby. The ghastly coincidence of the arrival of metric tons of teenage hormones along with universally-apparent boobs should not be downplayed.

And I admit that I do sometimes feel ashamed of myself. Really—it’s not some PC-inspired mea culpa here, I genuinely want to beat myself over the head when I discover that my glance has shot unerringly towards, say, someone’s maiden aunt’s topside. The age of the owner, as you may gather, doesn’t seem to matter to my eyeballs (or, more correctly, to my brain’s simian impulse which directs the gaze).

Hell, ”simian” used in that sense is an insult to apes, because they don’t spend most of their waking hours gawking at the herd’s females’ upper danglies.

Even worse: it doesn’t matter if said mammaries are covered up. My eyes do the same movie-like zoom to this girl’s upper assets:

...as I am to this pair (drawn by the same artist, Gil Elvgren):

Heck, even Edwardian fashion gets my neck to swivel like a Phalanx missile launcher.

And even more wonderfully, the more covered-up, the better:

However, I plead “justifiable peeking” when accused of caddish staring, and in front of me there is this on display:

Women Vs. Stick Figures

November 20, 2008
5:10 AM CST

Of the many things on this here website about which I’ve taken abuse, my fondness for large, curvy women has probably been among the leading contenders.

Allow me, then, to post two pictures (both taken two nights ago, at the same party): one of the world’s most celebrated curvies, and one of the world’s most famous supermodels, a byword for “beautiful” to many.

From left to right: Nigella Lawson and Claudia Schiffer

I need say no more.