Matter of Facts: This Is My Boomstick!!!

[00:00:06] Welcome back to the Matter of Facts Podcast on the Prepper Broadcasting Network. We talk prepping guns and politics every week on iTunes, Stitcher, and Spotify. Go check out our content at MWFPodcast.com on Facebook or Instagram. You can support us via Patreon or by checking out our affiliate partners. I'm your host, Phil Ravelet, Andrew, Nick are on the other side of the mic and here's your show.

[00:00:30] So we're going to try to do the administrative work as quickly as humanly possible. Welcome back to Matter of Facts Podcast, by the way. We have a little bit to cover. At least one of these topics is not really thought out because it happened to me. Five hours ago and I'm still like figuring out how to how we could have done that better, which Nick's going to help me with.

[00:00:50] But first and foremost, patrons, thank you all for supporting the show. Thanks for keeping the wheels on this bus. Sometimes it's on fire. Usually it's going downhill at a high rate of speed, but thanks for keeping the wheels on the fires on purpose. If it isn't, we're certainly gonna allege that it is right merch. If you're into hilarious t-shirts and six cents of humor. The merch is a good place to look. Those links are in the show description and Cypress survivalist March 8th, Southeast Louisiana in the vicinity of Mandeville.

[00:01:19] If you're into preparedness, if you would like to meet yours truly and my wife and my brother-in-law and my sister who are members of Cypress survivalist, if you want an in-person dose of a lot of the things we talk about on the show, y'all should look that up. Those links are also in the show description. That's two minutes dead. That's the fastest we've ever done admin work. I'm getting a better record. You are. Congratulations. Yeah, I just have to not talk as much, which is the tricky part for me.

[00:01:49] That's fine. So you said you want to talk about news. What's new in the world? And the question mark is purposeful because I don't know if it really is news that California is insane, but here is yet another example of California's insanity. And it does apply to this show.

[00:02:06] So back in 2019, the LA Department of Water and Power was attempting to replace some nearly hundred-year-old power lines that were going through a state park in the area of the recent Palisades Fire.

[00:02:25] Apparently, a, I will call it amateur botanist, was traveling through the area and noticed that they had done a no-no and had stepped on some endangered plants. According to, what is this, New York Post, it is Branton's Milkvec plant. It's some kind of flowering shrub.

[00:02:48] Anyway, they destroyed approximately 200 of these plants, and because of that, they had to cease their project, do a bunch of remediation, and never finished fixing all of the power lines that were known to be a fire hazard in the area where the Palisades Fire, the largest fire in LA's history, has happened. Is this a moment where I remind people that you don't detest bureaucrats enough? No one detests bureaucrats enough, and that's saying a lot.

[00:03:18] I mean, that sounds like a challenge, given your company, Nick. Like, most of us believe that we should try throwing politicians into volcanoes to sacrifice them for good weather. Just annually. I mean, there's no downside to it. What's the worst that could happen? Nothing. And that's still not bad. That's entertaining, at least. Right. You know, this just goes to show what, is it Mike Shelby that talks about the area studies all the time?

[00:03:48] Mm-hmm. You need to not just do area studies of the people and the places. You need to do area studies of the politicians and their history of decisions. This happened in 2019. Here we are, six years later. Chickens have come home to roost. 5,000 buildings are destroyed. And I believe a number of people died in this fire as well. Mm-hmm.

[00:04:16] So not only has 200 endangered tiny shrubs cost us 5,000 buildings, uncounted, to the extent of my knowledge, uncounted dollars in property damage, and several people's lives. But... Frankl knows where it's at. Yeah. And who knows? The gods may be appeased. Right. The gods may be appeased. We don't know.

[00:04:42] I mean, it still hasn't gotten me completed Star Citizen, but that's an entirely different podcast. So, you know, Phil, you brought up when we were talking before the show that this is kind of another in a long line of things we see out of California, like the fire trucks you brought up. Yeah, apparently another state donated a number of fire trucks to the, you know, to the effort.

[00:05:07] And apparently those fire trucks got detoured for mandatory emissions testing before being allowed to go and fight the fire. And I'm not... See, I'm not here to tell a person what they should believe or how to vote. Like, I believe in... I believe in freedom and self-imposed accountability. Like, if you want the fire trucks to detour from coming to save your house to go get smog testing, cool beans, go forward, do great things.

[00:05:36] Like, that is totally up to you. Comma however, comma. If ever there is a fire threatening my house and a politician stops those trucks for any reason at all, I'm going to be annoyed. I can understand them stopping them if there was a danger to life. You'd like a fire? Well, sure, yeah. But, I mean, you could... Sometimes you got to stop fire trucks because stupid people won't get their cars out of the way. I mean, these things happen. I'm sorry.

[00:06:06] That's when you just push the cars off the road. And I'm sure the firefighters would love that. I've seen the aftermath of what happens when you park a Beamer in front of a fire hydrant on an active fire setting. They will move it. That... Oh, no. Even better. They put the hose through the car. Jaws of life into the door, pry it open, and then bill you for the hose that your door cut. Yeah.

[00:06:34] Let me just give you all that little bit of intel if you're thinking about parking in a fire lane or in front of a fire hydrant. Firefighters literally live. They spend their entire careers waiting for the day when they get to use a halogen tool and an axe to open up your car like a tin can to make a point. So, I'm not saying don't give it to them. Just know what you're getting into.

[00:07:00] Like, they view you parking in front of that fire hydrant as a challenge. Congratulations. And they are going to tell that story for literal ever after they do it. And your insurance company will not be paying for it. And neither will the fire department. They will be less than amused, let's say. For sure. So, workplace emergency. So, about five hours ago now. Four and a half hours. Anyway.

[00:07:30] So, today this afternoon, I had to go to New Orleans for an all-hands meeting at work. Had the entire body there. It's been quite a while since we've gotten everybody together. And in addition to all that, I bumped into a couple of coworkers that, like, I haven't seen in person in a very long time. And we were catching up, chewing the fat, shooting the breeze.

[00:07:57] And during this, one of those coworkers passed the F out in front of me. Now, I know this coworker, and she has a medical condition that kind of makes this happen every now and then. But this is the first time it's ever happened at work. And needless to say, I was concerned when she just, like, passed smooth out in front of me.

[00:08:22] But as I was talking to Nick about the situation and what we did, how we reacted, and, like, how coworkers of mine that were involved reacted, I thought it merited a discussion because I can't imagine that a workplace incident that requires immediate action is that far out of bounds for the average person. Like, if you work long enough, sooner or later, you're going to have an incident at work that requires some immediate action. Yeah. Be it an accident or just a medical emergency like you had today.

[00:08:52] I mean, I work in manufacturing. The equipment is dangerous. People can get hurt. People do get hurt. People do. Usually due to their own carelessness. Yeah. So, in this case, like, and I haven't been faced with this exact situation too much in the past, like, but in this situation, you know, you have an unconscious person on the ground. Thankfully, she had the presence of mind to, like, crouch down because she felt it coming.

[00:09:20] It didn't just fall over like a tree, but she fell over and passed out. So, like, my immediate reaction was to put her onto her side, you know, kind of, like, tuck her knees up a little bit, put her in the rescue position. That way, if she vomited, she wouldn't aspirate on it. Try to keep her airway clear. Try to keep her down and stable and still because when a person passes out, they can start flailing around a little bit when they start to come to. They could seize. All kinds of things are happening.

[00:09:49] So, I wouldn't say that that was, like, a conscious thought, like, oh, I need to put her in the rescue position. Honestly, it was just, like, baked in, I don't know, probably a result of, you know, of military training. But, like, I know when you have a person that's unconscious, that's what you're supposed to do with them. Absolutely. So, I put her into that position, you know, like, had my hand on her head, had my other hand on her shoulders. I had control over her.

[00:10:16] At this moment, a friend of mine who was with me immediately called to somebody else and said, you call 911 or call EMS, which is one thing that has been impressed upon me. And for the sake of discussion, my friend who was there, the third friend in this discussion is also a military veteran. He's an Air Force vet. So, I know that there's those overlaps in our medical training. Like, we both come from a military perspective.

[00:10:42] And in the midst of all this, like, he did what is all, step one is always deal with the patient. Step two is always identify a person who is supposed to call EMS. Because it's been, in after-action reports, we've seen situations where, like, you've got six people standing around and you assume, I'm going to deal with the patient. One of you guys are going to call EMS. And then all six of them stare at each other because they're all waiting for one of them to call EMS. Bystander effect. Yeah. Yeah, it's pretty well documented. So, it's always been impressed upon me.

[00:11:12] And what my friend did was say, you pointed at somebody, made eye contact, got them to acknowledge and said, you call EMS. So that it is on that one person. It is that one person's responsibility. If that doesn't happen, it's your fault. Yep. And to simply short-circuit bystander effect, she immediately got on the phone and started calling for help. Perfect. Perfect.

[00:11:33] What I realized afterwards, and you and I were talking about this, but, like, my workplace is in this weird transitionary period where we've been working remote, kind of a leftover from COVID. We are working towards a return to office, return to fiscal office posture. And we are also in the middle of moving facilities. So, the person who got tapped to make the call, I don't recognize, I didn't recognize her. I think she's fairly new.

[00:12:03] She didn't immediately know who to call. Okay. So, she made a, she made a judgment call and to call 911, which is never the wrong answer. It's, it's not a bad call. Well, but like you and I were talking about, this facility has on-facility medical options and on-facility security. Like, we have our own assets there on the, on-site. And if those assets had been called, they could have gotten to us a little quicker.

[00:12:27] But eventually, St. Bernard Harris Fire Department and Acadia the Ambulance right behind them all made the trip in. And to their, to their credit, the front gate, when they see EMS rolling up, they don't ask questions. They just say, where are you trying to go? Let me point you in the right direction. Like, we'll, we will figure out why you're here once you get there. The correct answer, because otherwise the firemen are also going to have fun with your date. Yeah.

[00:12:52] So, like I said, I mean, within a fairly short amount of time, we had a EMS on site. I, as soon as I, as soon as my, my whole thing is as soon as I see professionals, I am taking a step back. I'm letting y'all do what y'all do. I stayed close, which was a necessary thing because by this time, my friend who had passed out was still a little off kilter. Still a little, she wasn't really incoherent or confused. She was very weak.

[00:13:21] And she didn't have an accurate understanding of what had happened because like she thought she was only like out for a second. I knew she was out for 30 seconds, things like that. Yeah. That makes sense. So like the one thing I could tell y'all is that in an emergency situation, like, you know, to me, the priorities are deal with the immediate patients, render aid and turn on your memory recorder because everything that happened is going to be pertinent at some point.

[00:13:51] EMS is going to need to know everything you know about the incident before they showed up. All of that helps them triage the patient. And really simple things like, well, she was passed out for five seconds or she was passed out for 30 seconds or did she hit her head or was she, you know, was she already supine when she, when she went with lights out. All those things get really important to EMS. They want to know all that, like they were there when it happened. So if you can be a good witness, that helps EMS treat the patient.

[00:14:22] Absolutely does. And that, that also applies, like, even if it's not a medical incident, if it's any kind of emergency incident, being a good witness helps a lot just to, just to turn your brain on and like notice what's going on and be able to retell it later. The other thing that really wasn't an issue for me or for my friend, because again, both was military veterans was neither one of us got really upset. Neither one of us got, you know, was freaked out. Neither one of us was losing our crap.

[00:14:47] But we both just kind of like very calmly took control of the situation, took control of her, took control of everybody around us. And once the professional showed up, we just said, Hey, this is the situation. This is what we know. Where do you need us? It's a benefit of good training. Yeah. You guys had reps. You, you know what to do when someone's unconscious. You've trained for it multiple times. I'm sure you've taken a first aid class since you got out of the military. Actually, I haven't. Really? Yeah.

[00:15:18] It's an update. I know. I know. It's, it's on my list of things to do, but the never ending list, dude, I get it, man. I haven't had a professional firearms or medical class since I was enlisted. So it's been 20 years, although I was telling you about it. Like to me, the part of this whole situation to me, that is kind of interesting to me.

[00:15:39] And it probably is going to be a no doubt to most people is like, I slipped back into that mindset of deal with the emergency, put everything else on hold. Without thought. Like I didn't, it didn't even occur to me to be worried about my, oh, my friend passed out. You know, what if she's okay? That didn't even occur to me until I got home. It wasn't until she was dealt with, she was, she was home with her husband.

[00:16:05] And every decision I made from the moment she said, I don't feel good until I came home after the whole thing was dealt with was pure autopilot. It was, it wasn't conscious thought. It was, this needs to happen. Go step A, step B, step C, step D. And then somewhere down the line, I got to, oh, Jesus, I really would love a bourbon and Coke and to sit here for five minutes in the quiet. Yep.

[00:16:33] So, but that's, that's exactly what I was referencing earlier. That is what happens when you get good, consistent training and you can process that training fully. I mean, if you don't have the training, it's just like not understanding how a tool works. You don't, your brain doesn't see the object as a tool until it knows how that thing works and knows what it does. So, you know. No, no, I mean.

[00:17:03] Good argument for getting trends. No, it makes complete sense. I mean, quite, quite frankly, this will, the, the end result of this situation is while it is fresh on people's mind, I am probably going to see if I can't lean on senior leadership about, because I know, I know at some point several years back, we had a, following an active shooter training.

[00:17:30] We got some advice from the instructor that did not get utilized. I mean, I don't know. That he consider hosting a stop the bleed class at our facility and admit five to 10% of the staff. Sure. Like that, that was the instructor's position was you don't need a single person with a medical bag. Like you need in a 600 man facility, you need 50 or 60 people with a tourniquet under their desk and the knowledge of how to use it.

[00:18:00] And that's going to be much more useful to you. So now I'm wondering to myself, like, is, is this the moment in time to through my boss, obviously, because I ain't, I ain't calling the front office willy nilly. But is this the moment in time to like reach out through my boss and be like, look, this is, y'all know what happened.

[00:18:21] You got the reports, but there's an opportunity here to learn from this and make, make the staff better able to deal with the situation in the future. We're lucky that this happened with a, with an army and an air force vet on hand who both have met, who both have some level of medical training, both have some level of deal with emergency situations.

[00:18:44] We are lucky that it was the two of us who were standing there, who were able to control the situation and get resources inbound. But if it hadn't been, if it had been two, two 22 year old kids fresh out of college, who didn't have our life experience, would we have gotten the same outcome? And you're lucky it was the medical condition that it was, and that it was a known and non-life threatening condition. Yeah.

[00:19:11] I mean, you guys got as lucky as you can possibly get when it comes to a medical emergency like that. I mean, I'm sure you have some people in your, in your workforce that are, you know, they're pushing 50, 60, getting close to retirement like that. Heart attack's not out of line. I mean, in the, in the 12 years I've worked at this place, I don't, I couldn't even tell you it's got, it's been dozens. We've had people wheeled out of there in ambulances.

[00:19:41] Most of the time they come back, but we've had people wheeled out of there in ambulances. I mean, there, hell, there was one week we had three in a week. I was really, I was, I was starting to wonder if there was LSD in the water supply or something. Cause like we had three people a week get car out by ambulances. That's not good.

[00:20:00] No, but, but the problem is when that much of your workforce is like approaching 65, frankly, you get into that situation where you're, you're in target rich environment. Put it that way. Unfortunately, that, that is how that works. I mean, the older you get, you're just kind of waiting for something to go wrong, either biologically or accident. The statistics are kind of against you at that point.

[00:20:26] So, yeah, that, that might be my own personal after action report to talk to my boss about and try to take to the front office. And, you know, just my, the way my brain works is always, first of all, it always goes to how bad could this have been? Which I'm thankful that this wasn't. But my other thought is, is like, okay, what were the lessons to be learned from this? And the lessons to be learned to me are the person who initiated trying to get help.

[00:20:56] They got help. They got help as quickly as they could. We might have an option to get help a little faster had there been better communicated and it had even better. And I'm guilty of that too, because I should, I feel like now I should have had that number like saved in my phone where I could have told her, call this number. Probably. Hindsight's 20-20. But when you consider the fact that I work remote 95% of the time, most of the time when I'm, if I have a medical emergency, it's here in this office and I call 911.

[00:21:24] I tell them I live at this, this, that, and the other in Mandeville. It's, I mean, I can make excuses for it, but what it really boils down to is there are lessons to be learned here so that we're better able to take care of the staff. And especially going back to fiscal office presence, I think this might be the opportune time to like point out to senior leadership. Like, Hey, these are things we need to cover with the whole staff as we go back into this posture.

[00:21:51] A, because that, that information is all changing because our facility is changing, but also B, because we've proven the staff doesn't know. Yeah. We've proven that now. At least the new staff doesn't know, which is probably a quarter of the agency. Okay. Then that's, that is an unacceptable number to me. That's an unacceptable number. Yeah. If 25% of the staff where I work did not know where the fire extinguishers were, which I think is equivalent, that would be a serious problem.

[00:22:21] To be fair. I don't know where the fire extinguishers are because I've been in the new building exactly one time and I don't know where they are yet. So that's, that's different though. You haven't been in the building, but it's the same end result. I guess what I'm saying there for multiple years, but I guess what I'm saying is it's the same end result. We all, we all, the entire staff has to have this briefing and has to have this knowledge because we're going into a facility where we're all going to be sitting there singing, singing, singing kumbaya and holding hands.

[00:22:49] We're going to have to know how to take care of a chair or something bad happens. Absolutely. So anyway, 20 minutes into the show, we finally get to what we set out to talk about. That wasn't a, Oh, by the way, something happened today at work and I just felt the need to decompress about it. So I cannot do a, um, this is my boomstick impression. I'm not going to try. Like I might've attempted yesterday, but after the afternoon I've had, this is the best you get as a banner and a, this is my boomstick.

[00:23:19] And if you don't know where that quotes from, you lived on awful shelter childhood. And I'm disappointed in your parents. You should watch army of darkness with your spouse or yourself. If you don't have a spouse, watch the entire evil dead series. They are just true. Heek. Terrible horror movies. There is a line where terrible turns into amazing though. It is an art piece. It is an art piece. I'm going to think of it.

[00:23:49] I bet my wife has never seen evil dead. Um, I have to rectify this immediately. That's going to, well, okay. So, but let me throw her. Evil dead. If I remember correctly, it's fairly child friendly. Let me throw my wife under the bus before we can get into this topic. My wife and I were talking about like awesome movies and everything she was naming was like goofy chick flicks and crap that I'm never going to watch.

[00:24:13] And I was like, yeah, well, you know, you, you really can't call yourself a human being unless you've seen blade runner. And she got this blank look on her face. And I was like, no, no. Must. You must watch now. What's blade runner. I'm like, and we've had that. We've had that decision point several times in our, in our relationship, even before we got married, where there was like some peak cyberpunk, sci-fi nerdy bull crap, like peak movie.

[00:24:43] And she had never even heard of it. Road warrior blade runner. Like my entire childhood just skated right past my wife. Tell me she's seen death race. Which one? 2000. Okay. Okay. Not the new one. The new one's dumb. Okay. But there's a segment of the audience out there that does not realize that David, that David Carradine starred in death rate in a death race movie.

[00:25:09] And it is infinitely better than the one that Jason Statham started. So much better. The hand grenade. The hand grenade alone. Just for that pun. Oh, Gillian said, I knew about blade runner. But you haven't seen it. Have you? She needs to watch it. It's required watching. I mean. Anyway.

[00:25:37] And Ragglefraga said, I saw the new one, not the old one. Listen, dude, go back. Watch, watch, watch him. Death Race 2000 is probably not with your kids, though. No, you should not watch it with your kids. There's lots of there's lots of like at least semi nudity involved. If not just straight up soft core pornography. I don't remember like full frontal, but definitely some boobies flopping around. Yeah. I mean, it was filming in the 70s, guys, like, you know, cultural norms at the time and everything. Cocaine.

[00:26:08] There's a lot of drugs going around. But I have to admit the cars steal the show because like you did like they're phenomenal. The cars are the most caricatured nonsense on earth and the characters driving the cars are the most caricatured nonsense on earth. The movie is amazing in the fact that it does not even attempt to take itself seriously. It is not ridiculous. Not even close.

[00:26:37] Oh, it's fantastic. Anyway. Stuart said, of course, I drop in when you're talking about porn. But what's the difference, really? Some cars are a form of pornography. I will allow it. I'm just saying. OK, but anyway, this is my boomstick.

[00:27:01] So I I've talked a few times about the fact that I got bullied into buying shotgun and I'm going to hold to the fact that I got bullied into it. None of you can talk me out of it. I was bullied. I did a self-preservation instinct. But that being said. I am.

[00:27:20] I've done what I normally do with shotguns and I like committed myself to learning everything humanly possible about them, reading tons of articles, reading tons of information, asking other nerd friends of mine looking at you, Nick. Questions that I don't know the answers to because I just wanted to learn everything about a subject. Hallelujah for unchecked, unmedicated ADHD. It's a thing. It's perfect. It's exactly what we need in this situation. What?

[00:27:49] The ability to obsessively and compulsively learn. Oh, yeah. That a subject until you're exhausted with it. Yeah, exactly. Spend spend exactly, you know, three weeks to 90 days, depending on how bad it hits. Learn every single possible thing you can and go. I'm missing many things. And then pull out the adult credit card. So my wife is questioning whether or not I was bullied and Stuart is saying shamed, not bullied. Okay. I was shamed, not bullied.

[00:28:19] Shaming is a kind of bullying. Shaming is a kind of bullying. Thank you, Nick. It's the best kind of bullying. It's productive. Well, it worked. I did. It produced a shotgun. I did end up buying a Breda A300, but that that that leads us down the rabbit hole that we are about to commit ourselves to. So.

[00:28:45] I figure we start off with like the great debate, first of all, of pumps versus semis and I'm over under versus side by side. Versus single shot. Oh, I guess let's just expand the mother effing topic. Like, are we talking about are we talking about home defense use or are we talking about general preparedness use where you need using for a bird gun or whatever else? Like, we're we're I mean, find the rules of engagement at this point.

[00:29:12] We can we can classify into into two things. Are you having a shotgun for entertaining yourself or are you having a shotgun for serious use? Yes. Personally, side by sides over and unders and single shots are no longer really serious use unless you're using like a single shot rifled shotgun for hunting in a in a jurisdiction that only allows for something like that.

[00:29:37] Pumps and semi auto shotguns have come to the point where they they outclass most of the rest of that category. If you want to dress up as Doc Holliday in a full leather duster with a side by side more power to you. I'll help you find that. Oh, Chappas. Yeah. Didn't that get wasn't that in Stargate Atlantis, too? I don't. Didn't have a hand in that? We for the audio listeners, we have to read the comment. Draggle Fraggle said, don't forget Chappas three barrel atrocity.

[00:30:07] I'm kind of OK with it, to be perfectly honest. I'll allow it. It's I'm wondering. It looks like I'm wondering why they didn't make a four barrel one too heavy. The three barrel was already insanely heavy. Right. Yeah. Don't be a girl. One of our one of our. Come on. I could probably outlift you. Jeff brings up a good point at that point. Just by a drilling. Drilling. Exactly. If you're going to buy it, if you're in a restricted area and you can only buy one weapon, a drilling is not a bad way to go.

[00:30:37] OK, there's a portion of the audience. Plus rifled barrel. I was about to say, there is a portion of the audience that doesn't know what a drilling is. So we have to. You don't look up forgotten weapons. There's plenty of drillings on that. Just look up forgotten weapons and just play it like that whole channel is peak entertainment. True.

[00:30:57] Well, as far as the discussion pumps versus semis, most semi-automatics, most modern semi-automatic shotguns now have gotten to the point where they perform as reliably as a pump action shotgun. And they remove part of the human error factor. Well, I don't know how much you've shot a pump shotgun. I pretty much exclusively shot pump shotguns until I got my A300. What about you?

[00:31:21] I mean, I had never touched a semi-automatics before I got my A300, but I've also never been much of a shotgun person. So my shotgun experience has been pretty much constricted to like a buddy of mine saying, hey, let's go shoot some clays or let's go goof off and shoot this demanding car or whatever. So I've shot pump actions before. I've never owned one. I've never seriously trained with one. I've always been more of a rifle guy personally.

[00:31:51] The one downfall I found with pump action shotguns myself is when I'm under a time constraint, I have a tendency to short stroke a pump shotgun. That's not your personal problem. It is. It is. It's a training issue. It's a training issue. And I didn't like shooting shotguns because I was never taught to shoot them correctly. You missed the innuendo, but go ahead. Oh, I know. I let that one slide. The.

[00:32:19] Anyway, you can create a pretty catastrophic malfunction if you short stroke your shotgun. If you do not complete the full revert, full rearward action, full forward action, you can jam up a pump shotgun pretty good. I've done it before. That's what usually tripped me up in three gun matches, the little bit that I did shoot them. You don't have that user error problem with semi-automatic shotguns.

[00:32:44] And I think if you've never owned a shotgun, if you've never shot a shotgun, I don't think there's a good reason to not buy a semi-auto. Other than cost. Sure. Yeah, sure. If all things being equal, if budget allows for it, I would say a semi-auto. But the semi-auto is like your A300. Would that run you? Hmm. Text, how to license, 11 hundred bucks. Yeah, I think I was like $850.

[00:33:14] Because I got a pretty good deal on mine. Yeah. I got a trying to put a friend's kids through college deal. I wasn't complaining. Sure, yeah. You weren't looking for sales. But like, I don't know, what a Remington 870 Express even costs right now. Let's look at sticker price. Do-do-do-do-do-do-do. I'm just waiting for you to see the stickers like $600, $500.

[00:33:44] Porn, cars, and short stroking. Correct. You missed Warhammer. And bourbon. Yeah. That is boring. That's all right. I've got a wide range of topics. But, you know... $400 or $500 for a reliable pump shotgun. No. I'll fight you on this. Maverick 88. Okay. $200.

[00:34:14] $250 if you've got to pay full freight for it. If you are on the ultra super slim budget, which, fair enough, there are people out there that probably are. $200 Maverick 88, I will never disparage that shotgun. That shotgun is extremely reliable. I forget it exists because I compulsively buy not super cheap guns.

[00:34:37] So, the thing about the Maverick 88 to me is, like, if you were between buying one of the $200 Turkish Turknelli specials and a Maverick 88, I would say get the freaking Maverick 88 every single time. Because... You can get parts. You can get service. You can get a warranty. Those Turkish guns, some of them are great. Some of them are great. Some of them are really terrible. Joe, to answer your question, the Maverick 88, Mossberg. Yep. Same guys that make the 590.

[00:35:05] They just, that's just their cheap version of it. Yeah, it's... The fit and finish is worse than the ones that I've seen. It is an appliance. It is not pretty. It is not nice. It is not cute. It does not have, like, all the cool bells and whistles on it. You will not impress your friends with it, but it will absolutely freaking go bang every time you pull the trigger point blank and period. And you can damn sure bet it'll kill somebody just as well as a 1301. 110%.

[00:35:33] So that's why I say, if you're back and forth between the cheapest freaking pump bag, the cheapest freaking, you know, semi-auto you can find, which is going to be in that $200 range, or a Mossberg Maverick 88, the Mossberg will run. The Turknelli, questionable. I don't... I don't know. Joe did ask, is it like an old school 500? I do not know. I know it's a Mossberg action, but I'm not sure which one it is.

[00:36:01] It is a Mossberg action for... And I haven't stripped the two of them side by side, so I couldn't tell you 100%. But from my understanding, the Maverick 88 was a simplification and a cost-saving exercise based on the 590. So, it is every corner we could cut in this shotgun without making the reliability go down. So, like, if that's what you're looking for, bargain basement, it'll run, but it'll run. I think the Maverick 88 makes a good point.

[00:36:31] If you're... Stuart says it is the old 500 action, just slightly simplified. Okay. Like I said, I didn't want to make that assertion just because until I can rip the two of them apart side by side, I don't want to make that assertion. And the Mossberg 500 was phenomenal. Yeah. Now, to answer raggle-fraggle, why not the 1301? So, I'm not going to debate that the 1301 might be a superior firearm to an A300.

[00:37:01] I'm not going to debate that. I think there is a debate to be had. But I think that what you're getting in an A300 is 90% of the capabilities of a 1301 at about 60% of the cost. So, where I always come from, not just firearms, but with everything, is I overlay, like, this cost versus value or performance graph. And wherever the two intersect is usually where I buy.

[00:37:30] I'm not going to spend a ton more money for a marginal increase in performance. I'm not going to sacrifice a lot of performance to save a couple of bucks. I look for the sweet spot in the middle where everything seems to make sense. And to me, the A300 is that. The limited experience I've had with it at this point, having only owned it for a couple of months, it has digested everything I have stuffed into it without complaint. It has never given me a bit of trouble.

[00:37:57] It is honestly softer shooting than I thought it was going to be, coming from pump action 12 gauges. It's not that difficult to strip and to clean and to reassemble. I really don't have a lot of issues with the A300. Raggle Fraggle said, I see a lot of the 1301 as aftermarket support. But here's my thing. Most of the stuff you can put on an A-1301 also works on an A300. Except for the stock.

[00:38:27] Except for the stock. Now, here's the thing. That's the big difference. And this is why I chose the A300 instead of the 1301. I, not mad at y'all, not even disappointed. Personal preference. I detest pistol grip shotguns. Same. Detest them. Do not like them. Do not like how they feel to shoot. Like, I like nothing about handling them whatsoever. And I have handled a fair bit of them. I don't like anything about them. It feels weird to me.

[00:38:57] Couldn't tell you why. Maybe a training scar. Maybe I'm just a fud in the making. I don't know and I don't care. I like nothing about pistol grip shotguns whatsoever. If you do, cool beans. I'm not mad at you. But I will never own one. And when you remove, I'd really like to put a pistol grip stock on this shotgun from the equation, the A300 and the 1301 really stack up pretty closely against each other.

[00:39:22] If you're the person that really wants to have like the baby Benelli M4, you need the 1301. Your options for putting a pistol grip stock on an A300 are very, very constricted. And I don't think that great. I have not found an aftermarket stock for the A300. I found one. Okay. I could hunt it down again and send me the link if you're really curious. I found one. I'm not looking for a pistol grip on it.

[00:39:52] I'd like a stock that's a little more, that feels a little more durable than the one that's on there. That is my one gripe about the A300. Other than the placement of the sling swivel in the back, the sling stud location in the back. It's not great. No, I actually have some solutions for the sling swivel in the back, but I'll be honest, using the factory one that's on the toe of the stock, I really haven't had a lot of gripes. I mean, it's not optimal, but it works. It does. It works.

[00:40:22] It's like I said, it's a minor gripe that I will probably address at some point. But until then, I just had to change how tight I like to run my sling to make it work. So, yeah. But insofar as aftermarket support for the A300, the truth of the matter is, is that if you want to change the forend, if you want to put a red dot on it, if you want to put a sling on it, if you want to put side saddle carriers,

[00:40:50] most of the things you would want to do to a 1301, you can do to an A300. The number of things you can only do to a 1301, if you'd like to aftermarket modify your firearms, that you cannot do to an A300 is a very, very narrow list. It is. So, and performance wise, there is a slight edge to the 1301. The lock to lock time on the blink action is faster. No argument.

[00:41:20] But if you can't pull the trigger and hold on target, well, and I take advantage of it. Can't. You and I cannot at this point. Yeah. I, I am not the illegitimate son of Jerry Mitchell. Like as much as that bothers me. Right. That'd be great. Especially with his ammo budget. My God. Yeah. But the best part is that class with a bunch of guys running 1301s, two guys running Pennellis, one guy running a trench gun. Andrew was running his 1301 and I was running my A300.

[00:41:50] There was not a single drill that I was falling behind on because of the gun. I was always the problem. But isn't that the way with like almost every class is that the, so I, I, when I was younger, I used to autocross a lot. So a lot of like my analogies come from the car world, but we always used to say that 90% of the problem is the loose nut behind the wheel.

[00:42:20] It's true. I mean, if, if you get to the point where you are out running your, your A300, great. You've put in enough reps that shotgun has paid for itself. It doesn't owe you anything upgrade, but realistically with the recoil on a 12 gauge, even if you're mitigating it correctly, the way you should using like a, a rip it or a push pull or however you want to, how, whatever you want to call it style recoil mitigation,

[00:42:46] you're probably not getting back on target before that action is fully cycled. Anyway, very unlikely to be perfectly honest. I've yet, I've yet to outrun it. Ammo. So, yeah, I was looking around and see if I actually had like a box of shotgun shells lying around, which I think they're all put away. I do have a case sitting over there, but I really don't feel like having to, you know, pick it up and bring it over here. To,

[00:43:13] to quote a few different YouTube personalities and track shotguns are, shotguns are a thinking man's gun. Number one, because of the low magazine capacity and number two, ammo selection. You guys that are in the Patreon group, you saw that I just recently got a couple of big boxes. In fact, it filled the backseat of my pickup full of mixed miscellaneous ammunition for shotguns. And I'm pretty sure I said F you. You did.

[00:43:42] You were a little upset with me to be fair though. Like 300 rounds of that was, was like three inch plus Magnums that I cannot shoot. So those are, those are getting sent down the, down the river to somebody else. I know who really hates themselves. That's, that's not, that's not the rule. You're, that means you're obligated by a new firearm. no, I found, I found a home for them before the seven day window. Okay. I'll give you that, but no, eventually I will probably sort that out. But as look, I have no use for a three inch shotgun.

[00:44:11] I really don't. I know people that own three inch shotguns that use them now. Yeah. Give it, give it time, but no shotguns. The great thing about shotguns is the variety of ammunition. I mean, you can have stuff like this. This is a one ounce slug. So a solid one ounce led projectile. Winchester surplus military overrun double lot, nine pellet. Have you shot any of that out of your a 300 yet?

[00:44:41] Shockingly consistent. Isn't it consistent? At seven yards, everything was in the eight ring on a standard IPSC torso target, which for those of you that don't know, it's like, figure like what's your plate spread in your armor. So like a 10 inch diameter circle, which yes, no, you could argue that that's bad,

[00:45:07] but I don't have a seven yard distance in my house where I will be using my home defense shotgun for home defense. If I am shooting at someone outside of the house, that's what this different round is for. That's another one ounce slug. So as a point of order, I paste off my house. The distance from my bedroom to my front door is seven yards. Perfect. And my three,

[00:45:38] a 300 likes those Winchester and her mill serves better than yours does. Cause it'll keep all those in a nine ring at that range. Really? Interesting. Now the longest shot I could possibly take in my house from my bedroom to my refrigerator is. Just shy of 15 yards. And at that range, it'll still keep all nine of those pellets in the seven ring. That's worthwhile. So this is part of the reason why,

[00:46:07] like, again, admittedly being very ignorant and owing to a lot of tutelage from you and from other patrons who know more about shotguns than I do. I started really digging into this idea of like the shotgun is a payload delivery system. The ammunition is what allows you to kind of like make this thing meet all these different needs. Yep. And I got really hyper focused on, okay, real world examples. What are the distances in my house?

[00:46:34] And how devastating is the shotgun at those ranges? And when I realized I was talking about seven and 14 yards in my house and 14 yards is the longest shot I could possibly take in my house. I realized that that 12 gauge is the most devastating home defense firearm in my arsenal by a wide margin. Because you're getting nine 30 caliber pallets unless you're using federal flight control eight pallet,

[00:47:04] which if you can find it, buy it, load it, test it in your shotgun, you'll love it. It's like it patterns like a slug. Um, nine 30 caliber projectiles in one trigger pull. Terminal element. Don't beat me to the punchline. So, yeah. So, like, that's been my observation is that we, at, at what is, what I can say are home defense ranges. Cause I've measured my own house. 12 gauge, double odd,

[00:47:32] nine pellet buckshot is going to put more anger onto a target than anything else I can bring into a fight. And this is from a guy who's been a rifle guy his entire life. And I can tell you that the, the payload delivery capabilities of 12 gauge have impressed me so much that I could honestly say inside of a house, I might grab that 12 gauge for grab anything else at this point.

[00:47:59] The only thing that I would say that makes an argument is you live in a state where suppressors can be had. I don't own any. I know, but I'm saying if, if a guy did own a suppressor and if a guy did have a short barreled AR to put that on either an AR pistol or an SBR, that would be king simply because you're not going to have time to don hearing protection. I don't know about you,

[00:48:27] but I've had 12 gauge popped off near me when I didn't have ear pro on it sucks. That was outside. Do not want inside. I mean, what's a, what's a, what's a ruptured eardrum next to, right. Which I will, I will take that choice any day. Fair enough. But if I had the option to use an AR with a suppressor for my home defense platform, a hundred percent, yes, I would, but my state sucks.

[00:48:57] Sorry. Yeah. I keep offering to help you find a house down here. You keep saying, you keep bitching about the mosquitoes and the heat and stuff. The mosquitoes, the humidity, my wife, not wanting to be that far from family. Okay. I can't imagine which one's worse. I can't help with that. I want to be far from family, but I'll act like her crazy older brother. And I'm pretty fun to hang around and the mosquitoes. That's why you, that's why they make birdshot. I know. I know. Okay. We got to get out.

[00:49:27] We're going to try to get out of the state eventually. Yeah. Oh, it's not kind of bad point. Stewart said an eight 70 with a 28 inch smooth, smooth with chokes, 18 inch tactical and an 18 inch rifle. It is the ultimate apocalypse firearm. That's actually what he was trying to encourage me to buy. Instead of the 300 was you can do the same thing with the a 300 though. And now you've got a semi auto one ounce slug delivery system. Can you change the barrel for that short 19 inch to a,

[00:49:57] longer one on a 300 though? Yes, you can because the a 300 was a duck and goose gun before it was a tactical shotgun. Hmm. That might actually be worth thinking about. The a 300 action has been around for like 20 something years. They've got 28 inch barrels down to 18 inch barrels. Well, 18 and a half. I think, I think it's 19, but it doesn't matter. Yeah. Whatever it is. It's yeah. It's, it's short tactical barrel all the way out to full range goose barrels.

[00:50:24] They've got chokes for them anywhere from cylinder all the way to Turkey. So Joe just said they had breakfast with me, my family, and I am entertaining. I was actually trying my best to like, not be a complete weirdo that morning, but you know, my wife has social graces in the family. I'm just the, um, the moron. It is all about balance. Yes. Okay. So I see here some birdshot seems prudent now that we have a step into this

[00:50:54] drone apocalypse. So this has been my recent thing with my shotgun is I, first of all, I went and bought locally some Winchester target loads and they were like that mid velocity, like 1250 feet per second. The like number eight or number seven, seven and a half in this case. Seven and a half. Yeah. It's a very common target load. Yeah. And that's what I was looking for. Cause I wanted something that like, I could say, okay, well, it run this. And if I run this, it should be able to run things on your side of the margin.

[00:51:24] But I got some of that. I ran through my eight 300, by the way, it fricking digested perfectly. Didn't bitch. Didn't complain. Ran it perfectly. I mean, it ran it perfectly locked the bolt back on an empty magazine tube. It was perfect. So I think what I used for that class at, at, uh, MDFI was 1150 feet per second, federal target loads and not a single malfunction all day. 300. Yeah.

[00:51:52] So now that I would know that my 300 will run it reliably. Now I'm looking at a factory bread, a choke, probably a modified, I think is kind of the consensus from you should have modified right now. I don't, that gun only came with one choke and it was a, uh, some is a model. Really? Mine came with a modified. I'll have to review the number of notches in the, um, in the choke, but I'm pretty sure it's a model. I'm pretty sure it's a cylinder.

[00:52:20] Unless I mistranslated mine. One of us might be mistaken. One of us is wrong because I'm pretty sure that the a 300 ships of the modified cylinder choke, I thought it was a cylinder choke. Yeah. Well, either way. I mean, I would look at, I w I'm going to be buying a full choke kit for my a 300. I'm going to be getting everything from cylinder to Turkey. See, I really don't think I would use most of those chokes. I'm mostly,

[00:52:50] although, you know, maybe that would be a thing to do depending on cost would just be to suck it up and buy the damn kit. It is what I'm really buying the kit than to buy onesie twosies. I'm not shocked by that, but what I'm really thinking about is, is like, if I get the chokes for it and if I can find the choke that makes this thing run target loads reasonably tight, then I would have another option for utilizing this a 300 because currently with the cylinder choke that I'm pretty sure is in it,

[00:53:20] this thing, like I said, at, at, at 15 yards, it put almost every pellet in an eight ring. It was surprisingly tight at that range. That is pretty. Conversely, I shot three shots of that target load and it covered the entire target, not just the entire silhouette, the paper. It peppered the entire thing. It went everywhere. Like, and this is what it's supposed to do.

[00:53:46] But Stuart did indicate that that's the thing about shotguns and chokes is that normally a choke, it'll tighten up birdshot and it has the opposite effect on birdshot makes it start flinging pelts in all directions. Buckshot. That's what I meant. So the bigger the pellet, the more the tighter choke makes it spread. The smaller the pellet, the tighter the choke brings the, brings the spread together. Frickin shotguns are black magic. Well, it's, it's because you're trying to squeeze a bunch of golf balls through a two inch

[00:54:15] pipe versus squeezing a bunch of marbles through a two inch pipe. There's just more room to compress those things down. That's, that's the deal. I suppose that makes sense. And we've already talked about chokes. So we've gone out of order like we usually do. It's fine. Order's irrelevant. Yeah. Now the only other thing I'm thinking about, and I'll send you the link for it. It's an interesting idea. There is actually a company I found that makes, they make aftermarket chokes for variety shotguns,

[00:54:45] including the eight 300 and they make one, they call the buck kicker for the eight 300. Okay. It is a, an extended ported choke made specifically for buckshot. So it's meant to mitigate recoil of which the eight 300 doesn't have a ton of it to begin with. And to neck and to make the, that buckshot pattern a little bit tighter.

[00:55:10] I'm not sure the pressures in a shotgun are high enough for a ported barrel to make much of a difference, but I will be interested to try it. I will send you the link so you can peruse it. It's like the only, I think I'm cost. I might buy it for science. Yeah. I mean, other than, other than just really wanting to get like the perfect choke that makes it. This thing spit out birdshot in a reasonable fashion. That's the only other thing I've even thought about, but I mean,

[00:55:38] chokes are one of those weird things that me being a former rifleman coming into the shotgun world. It's kind of like voodoo to me. Cause it's like, what do you mean you shove something in the barrel that influences how the shot patterns? Cause like, if you just shove random shit into a rifle barrel, that's how you banana peel the rifle. You know, you're not supposed to do that. But then the shotgun guys are all like, yeah, you just screw this thing in and it does this. It does witchcraft inside and it makes it kill birds better. Yes. Yes. It, it,

[00:56:08] it is seriously. It's been an interesting transition from a rifleman to a shotgun guy because I told you, convert you. I've learned. Yeah. But I've learned things that still don't make any sense to me. Like, what do you mean? That's the way. Oh, but, and by the way, I'm a nerd. We all know this. I admit this. I, I, I, I'm not even ashamed of it anymore. Looking at how the internal mechanism of shotgun works. Yes.

[00:56:37] I swear to Christ. It's like a Rube Goldberg machine that spits out, that spits out lead as a manufacturing guy. It is a beautiful piece of technology. It is. It is so beautiful. The way that thing works. You could not make that lifter mechanism more simple without making it worse. It is so wonderful. I, I will say that like in the past, I've referred to double action revolvers as Rube, Rube Goldberg machines,

[00:57:07] because like if, if you have, if you have never taken the side plate off of a Smith and West revolver and looked at all the bell cranks and the gears and the, the canuter valve and the squirrel with the, you know, with the kazoo and all the crazy shit that's going on inside of there that they use to make this thing rotate, so in or spit out bullets. The inside of a double action revolver is witchcraft. Shotguns are that all over again, just with bigger parts there. But at the same time,

[00:57:36] they're so deceivingly simple. It's interesting. Stewart saying, put a duck bill muscle device on it. Blunder bus. Why not? Stewart. There was there. Stewart was alive when they designed the blunder bus. Well, that makes sense. For anybody in the audience, Stewart, Stewart is the oldest human being I know. He, he was there. He was John Moses, Moses Browning, apprenticed under Stewart.

[00:58:06] He's going to kick my ass one of these days when he meets me in person. It'll be fine. It'll be fine. So two more things. Ammo carriers. You were holding a one earlier and we were debating whether or not YouTube is going to shut down our feed. This, I think, is probably one of the better ammo carriers you can get. It's incredibly simple. It's backed with the last. It's elastic backed with Velcro. Yeah. Buy some industrial Velcro and stick it on the side of your shotgun. If you buy an a 300,

[00:58:36] it comes with the piece of Velcro to stick on the side of your shotgun. It's great. It's laser cut. It's looks really nice on your shotgun and you can just swap these things up. Best thing about these suckers. They fit in a 30 round mag pouch of your state ends up deciding to be dick waffles like mine did. And I can't use 30 round AR mags anymore. Alrighty then. Seven round 12 gauge shotgun cards. You can fit one on your receiver.

[00:59:02] You can fit one on your stock if you're feeling extra spicy for home defense. If you are able to have time to put your plate carrier on. Great. Now you got mag pouches full of 12 gauge. The funny part about 12 gauge is that if you're talking about your traditional nine pellet buckshot, you actually have 27 projectiles. Which, no, no, no, I am totally screwing up math. Seven times nine. You have 63 projectiles.

[00:59:31] Twice as much as an AR with a 30 round magazine. Twice as much. Yeah. So you've got five in the tube, one in the chamber, one ghost load. You've got seven on the receiver. You've got seven on the stock of your shotgun. No, no. The A300 seven plus one. Not in Illinois. Oh, you poor bastard. I didn't mean to rub that in. Oh, I know. I know.

[00:59:58] It took me an extra two and a half weeks to get my A300 because I had to buy a five round neutered version. That's why they gave you a $200 break on the price, you know, so they wouldn't kick in the balls twice. Pretty much, yeah. But either way, let's be realistic here. There are very few problems in life that five plus one plus a ghost load of 12 gauge will not solve. That's valid. That's valid.

[01:00:26] As far as like ammo carriers for shotguns, like, I don't even know if at this point we can justify the old school like plastic side saddles. They just, they have their place. There are versions of that now that are Velcro backed just like these. And supposedly they do retain your shotguns a little bit better. Joe asked if you can get a tube extension in Illinois. Technically, no.

[01:00:57] Realistically? Realistically, good luck to Pritzker searching every UPS, FedEx, and USPS package coming to anyone's home. They're not a controlled item. Most manufacturers don't check because that's on you. So, you do you. And don't admit to it on the internet. Mm-mm. Never admit to anything on the internet. Yeah.

[01:01:26] And so, the very last thing, and this is where I return the favor for Nick participating in my shaming and bullying to force me to get an A300. Red dots on shotguns are a war crime. They're the best kind of war crime. Dude, I'm going to tell you that, like, and this has been, like, the final and the most recent addition to my A300 has been to go ahead and get a Scalarworks mount on it.

[01:01:54] And put a Holosun 507 comp. I'm going to postulate for a moment. And I understand that there are people that have feelings about Holosuns. You like things that are made in America, and I'm not mad at you. I get it. But I'm going to suggest that the radical system that Holosun has in that 507 comp, which, if I remember correctly, is a 2-MOA dot with a 30-MOA circle around it. That is freaking tailor-made for shotguns.

[01:02:23] It is so fast. It is so quick to freaking line up in that optic. And because of that 30-MOA dot, when you're bringing the shotgun back down at a recoil, your eye zeroes in on it so fast. Like, red dots on shotguns are war crimes. Look, I've been saying it for years. Donut to death plus a center pip is the optimum red dot sight for a long arm.

[01:02:51] With an AR-15, until the recent ban went into effect, I was using a Vortex Spitfire 1X 32-mil donut with a pinpoint in the center. If you are within 50 yards and that donut is on your target, pull the trigger. You're going to make a center mass hit. If you're at 300 yards and that center pip is on their head, pull the trigger. You're going to make a torso hit.

[01:03:20] It is perfect for anything at a reasonable range with a carbine. It is even more perfect with a shotgun. Because if you can set it up so that your slug is your center pip and your ring is your 7-yard group with your double lot, you can't go wrong. You don't have to re-zero for slugs or buck. You don't have to really re-zero for birdshot because you can probably windage that out if you're changing out your choke.

[01:03:50] I haven't done any 12-gauge shooting against clays with a red dot yet because I am waiting for budgetary reasons for my red dot. I'm pretty sure you can have – Joe asked if you can have a red dot in Illinois. I'm pretty sure you can. I'm not aware of that being made illegal in Illinois. But then again, the state police doesn't know what's illegal in Illinois currently. That is a good point.

[01:04:16] They are not even sure how to enforce it or what to enforce. But I will say that the other pro to having a red dot on a shotgun is that what a red dot does that even I didn't really appreciate when I first started getting into red dots. What a red dot does is it puts your aiming reticle and your target in the same plane of view. So, to me,

[01:04:45] like you can train yourself even with iron sights to shoot with both eyes open. It's difficult in my experience. It takes a lot of training, a lot of practice because your eye and your brain are constantly fighting over what's supposed to be in focus. But with a red dot, you open up both your eyes and you just see this hovering red dot over your target.

[01:05:09] And the weird part is that me having a pretty significant astigmatism, red dots normally looks like starburst. And I just have to know that the very center of that starburst is where the bullet's going to go and figure life out. Or the brightest part of that starburst is where the bullet's going to go, whether that's on center or not. But in this case, when I shoot with both eyes open with this red dot, with this shotgun, it looks perfectly clear when both my eyes are open. And I have not figured out why that is.

[01:05:38] An optometrist might know. All I know is that in practice at the range, I was able to have both eyes open, full field of view, because I'm using this little bitty, you know, like an RMR style micro red dot. But with really thin, with a really thin bezel, with a really big window, it doesn't really obscure much. And I can see the entire range. And I just see this little circle and pip sitting there over my target. That's why I say red dots on shotguns are war crimes.

[01:06:08] I will be the first to admit that when I first got this shotgun, first took it out to the range of iron sights, the factory irons are good. They are surprisingly good. They are plastic, which I'm not a fan of. And I will be replacing them with steel. You know, I'm a defensive weapon. I do not accept plastic sights. And yet, in spite of that, how many police departments around the country have glocks with plastic sights in them?

[01:06:34] How many police departments across the country have officers that can't hit a torso target under a time constraint? That's a different discussion. No, no, it's the same discussion. These, these, if we're going to talk about the performance of police departments and the equipment they use, we have to discuss the fact that the officers do not perform up to a level of a basic IDPA shooter. But, but isn't the fact that the officers can't hit the broad side of the barn and drop their guns more than shoot them indicative of the durability of the weapon?

[01:07:05] Of the Glock? Of the Glock? Yes. It's, it's like giving an A, it's like field testing anything with Marines. If they can't lose it, break it, or get it pregnant, then it's soldier proof. I'm not sure any object on the planet has yet to meet that criteria aside from the P-58 can opener, which is why it's the perfect implement.

[01:07:29] Somebody out there is a Marine who is giggling because the rest of y'all who have your feelings hurt are not Marines. I grew up with a lot of Marines and it is impossible to hurt their feelings because they weren't issued any. Right. The guy that gave me all that shotgun ammo, Marine. Yes. He would love that joke. God bless my double dogs out there. I wasn't one. I couldn't fit my head in the jar, so I failed the test. I had to go into the army instead. That happens. Yeah. Gotta love them.

[01:07:58] But yeah, I mean, I hear you about the plastic sights. All I'm going to say is like, if you got an A300 and out of the box, you told me, dude, the plastic, the, the, the irons in air quotes, the fed, the open sights are fine. I don't need a red dot. I don't, they are there. I don't know if I ran too much on them. Yeah, they work. They're there. They're shockingly good for what they are. They're intuitive. They're easily visible.

[01:08:26] Their size is appropriate for a 12 gauge at reasonable, at reasonable self-defense ranges. You are not going to precision pick headshots at 200 yards. You're not going to. That's not the purpose of the shotgun. But even that being said, at 15 yards, those, those open sights put a slug exactly where I was aiming. Like no shock image necessary. Yeah. They are out of the box. Shockingly good.

[01:08:53] But personally, I, aside from a sling, that shotgun needs nothing out of the box to be a functional self-defense tool. Some S-TAC ammo carriers. Yeah, but I mean, you, if a guy was going to, you know, back pocket of his jeans or front pocket of his hoodie load it, there were guys that at the class that had no shell carriers guys running a 1301. He's loading out of his hoodie pocket. That is a worse. I will. I will. It works.

[01:09:23] I will allow that red dots are not in the mandatory category for this shotgun or a shotgun. I will just say highly encouraged category. I'm going to, I'm going to tell you that for a hundred bucks for scalar work mounts. And then, I mean, what does a hollow set 407 cost? On Amazon? 300. 311 on Amazon. If you're willing to pay Amazon prices. I've seen them cheaper than that. Yeah. You can get it. I'm just saying if you want it tomorrow, Amazon will have it to you for 300 bucks.

[01:09:53] Yeah. But I mean, you could go get a bargain, bargain basement, hollow sun 407. Hell, if you want to, I mean, you could, you could look at some like getting optics or swamp Fox or some of the lesser than recommending zero tech. Yeah. I'm, I'm still on the fence about that. I'm whether or not I want to try that for the shotgun. They, they are telling me the guys from zero tech are telling me that I can't break it with 12 gauge recoil.

[01:10:19] Well, and so when we had that discussion about putting a red dot on a shotgun, like that is the only thing that worries me is it's like putting a red dot on a fricking 50 BMG. You're not talking about the same recoil forces. First of all, that like a nine millimeter handgun is going to induce with the slide going back and forth. And we are way out of pocket when we compare it to something like a five, five, six out of a 16 inch carbine. So like the recoil forces are so much more violent.

[01:10:49] I have trust issues with less than a certain quality level of a red dot. Put it that way. I think to hollow, I think a hollow sun, tragic on an aim point. I think any of those should be, should be. Vortex. Vortex. I have for their, for their warranty, man. I have beaten the absolute piss out of my Vortex optics and I have yet to have one fail. But battery hungry. Yes.

[01:11:19] But having one fail, never. So the only thing, the only concern I have, and this isn't personal, this is secondhand, but I have talked to a person that has, I can't remember which, what they call it, but it's like their version of an RMR. Yeah. I have, I have heard secondhand that that one does not have the durability that the rest of the Swamp Fox Red Dots have.

[01:11:41] Like, what I have, what I have back there on that AR is a Strike Fire 2, which is basically a copy of like an old aim point comp. And it's enormous. It's heavy. It uses a CR2 battery, which is the only thing in my entire inventory that takes that god awful thing. But it works and it's taken a lot of beatings. So I can't complain too loudly. I don't know.

[01:12:08] I would just say that like whatever red dot you think about for a shotgun, just go into it understanding that you are going to torture test this optic because of the firearm you're putting it on and choose accordingly. And I would say that be mindful of the reticle. I highly recommend the 30 to 32 MOA donut with the center pit. For shotguns, there's no reason to deviate from that.

[01:12:37] But there's not really a huge benefit to going to a single dot, either large or small. It's not like a pistol. You know, it's nice to be able to pattern your shotgun and know that all of your pellets are going to be inside of that donut, whatever it is. Yeah. And I'll also say that like the one thing I can tell you is that no matter what red dot you think about putting on a shotgun. I've been super impressed with Scalarworks mount.

[01:13:06] Reptilia makes another good one. And there's a couple of others out there that I've heard of that seem to be well liked. I'll be honest, having put Scalarworks on my shotgun, that's the only one I'll recommend. The so I am. This might sound weird, but like I notice things when it looks when I talk about a product that like are outside of what the actual product is.

[01:13:32] And what really grabbed me about Scalarworks is, Nick, if you meet a person and you notice like their office is like hyper organized, everything's put away, everything's boxed up or pinned up, everything's labeled. You start to get a feeling for that person based on their workspace, right? Absolutely. When you open the Scalarworks box that that mount comes in, every single thing is in its own individual package. Everything is labeled.

[01:14:01] Everything is stupid proof. The mount has the torch specs written on it. Oh, that's nice. So what I look at is and if you read the instructions, it makes it almost freaking idiot proof. I appreciate the fact that. I see obvious efforts made to make the process of installing this mount on your shotgun as painless as humanly possible.

[01:14:30] And that catches my attention. So like for that, I haven't handled a reptile yet. They probably make a fine product. Everybody tells me they do. But when I opened up the box at Scalarworks and I see they include the Torx bits you need, they include all the screws. The screws already have Loctite applied to them. The Torx spec is written on the mount. All those things catch my attention. And I'm like, oh, you guys put some thought into making this dummy proof. You know, this reminds me of a quote from my grandfather.

[01:14:59] I started working at his machine shop when I was 13. And one thing he taught me and he insisted on was the packaging is the first thing your customer will see. And that sets the expectation for your product. And that is a lesson that I have tried to apply to life in general. You know, how you present yourself is the first thing that you are going to get as far as impression wise. And if you screw that up, you got ground to make up.

[01:15:29] But if you do it well, that can assist you. Now, Joe brings up a really good point. What is patterning a shotgun? What it is, is taking loads from your shotgun at a known range, a known distance, and firing them and seeing where the pellets fall. Phil's shotgun, using the Winchester ammo at seven yards. What did you have, Phil? I kept all my rounds inside of a nine ring on an IPSC target.

[01:15:59] On the exact same make and model of shotgun, with the exact same make and model of ammunition, I had them all in an eight or a seven ring, depending on the shot. That's a pretty significant difference. We have the same shotgun. We're shooting the same ammo. Shotguns are weird like that. Because you have a cluster of pellets that you're forcing down a barrel.

[01:16:26] So what you do is, is you buy a number of different ammos in the type you want, say double-aught buck. So I bought a bunch of this Winchester Military Overrun because it was cheap. It's double-aught. It's probably going to send. No problem. I've also got some Federal Flight Control eight pellet on the way. I've got some Federal Flight Control, some regular nine pellet on the way. You and I need to talk about that Federal eight pellet. It's magic. It is like shooting slugs at 12 yards.

[01:16:56] We need to talk about where the hell you found some, because I've been looking. I got a guy. Don't worry about it. You need to introduce me to your guy, Nick. You've been holding it up. I bought it all. You son of a bitch. He only had two boxes. He only had two boxes. And besides, it was from Illinois, so you'd have to get a background check to get it anyway. Oh, I hate your freaking statement more than already did. You've got to get a background check every time we buy ammo now. You know how many background checks I've had this year?

[01:17:25] It's gotten ridiculous. As many as your governor's eating cheeseburgers, apparently. Yes, that's a bad joke, and I don't care. He eats a lot of cheeseburgers. I don't know if my budget can keep up with his cheeseburger consumption. But we're getting close. We're trying. No, next time I find some online, I will let you know. Lucky Gunner was the last place I found it online, but I knew a guy a couple towns over that had it. That could be the difference, Stuart.

[01:17:55] Perfect. If, for some reason, Phil ended up with a cylinder choke and mine ended up with modified, my slightly tighter choke shooting double-aught may be the reason why I'm getting a slightly larger pellet spread. Perfect, Stuart. I need to pull that out and find out. So, I will pull the choke out of my shotgun literally as soon as we wrap up. Because now I'm... Find my choke wrench. Now I'm extremely curious if you and I have different chokes in that shotgun. But that's...

[01:18:23] If we do, that gives me a question about Beretta's quality control. I wonder... And it may be the difference of five tube and Ultima Patrol seven tube. Because it's technically two different models of shotgun. That's what I'm wondering. Because, I mean, like... I don't know. Like, I'm not trying to make excuses for Beretta, but maybe that is the difference. That could be the difference. I don't know. Hmm.

[01:18:52] But I am very curious because I thought I had a cylinder choke in mine. But now, I mean, we're going to go... And for those of you who have Beretta's with a mobile choke system, for what I recall, the number of notches in the top of the choke tells you what it is. But having had mine out of the shotgun once or twice, it doesn't look like it's neck and much down. So, I don't know. I'll pull it out and I'll let you know, Nick. But I'm... Yeah, I mean, it...

[01:19:21] Everything I'm looking at online here, because I'm Googling as we speak right now, it seems that the Ultima, which is not the Ultima Patrol, comes with a modified cylinder. And the Ultima Patrol comes with a cylinder choke, perhaps. And I have an Ultima Patrol. And I have an Ultima. The difference is the two-round mag tube extension. Oh, we might have just uncovered it. But yeah, dude, pull your... That could be it.

[01:19:48] I will, when I find my choke wrench. It is in my safe somewhere. It is a big safe. I keep mine with all my cleaning supplies on my workbench. Seemed like a good place to keep it. That's probably wise. I just stuck it in my safe, because this is my first shotgun with an interchangeable choke. So, I didn't know what to do with it. Mm-hmm. But yeah, I'm very curious what choke is in your shotgun.

[01:20:17] Because if that's the case, then you're... I need a cylinder. A cylinder choke might be all you need to tighten up your barrel a little bit. I mean... And if that means this 500 rounds of Winchester military overrun can put me in a six-inch pattern, that'd be very, very nice. That's... I mean, like I said, that's... Every shotgun pattern is differently. What I can tell you is that... Mine seems pretty consistent, one inch per yard.

[01:20:48] But that's not a hard... That's very common. But that's not a hard-fast rule, because... No. It didn't make a 15-inch circle at 15 yards. It was smaller than that. So... Yeah. That... I gotta admit, this Winchester mill surf that I got... And by the way, I overran you, and I got three cases of it. I've shot a couple of boxes, but, you know, it's like, what, 65 cents a shell for a nine-pillet double-odd buck?

[01:21:17] It's hard to argue. It's so freaking economical. Like, once I got the first case, and I ran it through my gun, and my gun seemed to like it, I was like, yes, my paycheck is going to be upset. One thing to notice, some of it is steel cup instead of brass. Yeah. So, you're not going to be able to reload it if you are a shotgun reloading guy. And be cautious of moisture. I'm not. And I don't intend to be, because reloads... Cautious of moisture?

[01:21:45] No, I mean, reloading. I am not buying a whole other reloading set to reload shotgun. Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope. I probably will, just to make overly complicated and unnecessarily heavy shooting slugs. No, I'm resisting the urge. Do it. No. No. I'm just saying. I'm just saying. No. And full brass, 12-gauge hellbar rounds.

[01:22:14] Listen, y'all have already shamed me into buying a shotgun. 400-grain monolithic copper. Y'all have already shamed me into buying a shotgun. You are not shaming me into reloading for shotgun. I got to draw the line someplace. Nonsense. There's no line to be drawn here. There is. I'm getting encouragement from third-party sources. Well, he's hardly trustworthy. I mean, he's a little sketchy compared to me. That's fine.

[01:22:43] I'm a little sketchy. We all are. We're all a little shady. Okay. I don't know what else we could really talk about in the realm of shotguns. I mean, the truth of the matter is, it's like, I will be the first to admit I came into the shotgun world with some preconceived notions that were partially based in bull crap and partially based in my own limited experience.

[01:23:06] And once I opened my mind and started thinking about, okay, what is a real – because, again, coming from that military experience, my mindset was, well, if you can't shoot at 300 meters, then what's the point? But then you start measuring the inside of your house, and you're like, my house isn't 300 meters wide. No, it is not. And if it is, congratulations, sir. Yeah, seven freaking yards will get you from the front door to my bedroom.

[01:23:35] So if I can control seven meters or seven yards, I'm golden. And when you start thinking about things in terms of that, that, oh, well, this cheap Winchester milserve double-odd buck, it makes a nine-inch circle at seven yards. It's like, but a nine-inch circle is nine freaking pellets hitting the body at seven yards at 1,350 feet per second. There's an awful lot of vital organs in the nine-inch circle. Yeah.

[01:24:04] It's – that really is kind of like what has won me over towards the shotgun world is, like, it is – I wasn't a shotgun guy either, man. Yeah. I got forced into it. And honestly, I love it now. It is one of my favorite firearms in my safe right now. I still don't know that I have any kind of, like, emotional or particular attachment to a 12 – to a shotgun. Only because, like, to me, everything is like tools in a toolbox.

[01:24:34] Oh, sure. But I'm saying the effectiveness is undeniable. But that's what I was going to say. Like, I think what – I think what has won me over is if I look at everything in terms of the capability it grants you, what a 12-gauge is to me is the ability to put more violence on target faster at realistic home defense ranges than any other firearm in my inventory.

[01:25:01] And I've always been really big about this does something this doesn't. That's why it's here because these – there is no one firearm that does everything perfectly. Well, I don't have anything else that can put 430 grains of violence onto a target in one shot. And to go a little bit further – That's 9-5-5-6 rounds – or 8-5-5-6 rounds rounded up. But let's put this in terms, okay?

[01:25:31] A shot – the Bredda A300, if you don't live in Cuckville, Illinois, sorry – No, no, no. It is Cuck State. But mine will hold – you can ghost load mine with 7 in the magazine and 1 on the lifter and an empty chamber. If you really want to be creative, you could put 9 into it. But let's make 8. Let's make it 8 because it makes the math nice and simple, okay? Yeah, sure. 8 1-ounce slugs or 8 1-ounce buckshot rounds.

[01:26:01] Half a pound. That is the ability to put half a pound of lead at 1,300 feet per second plus on target in seconds. There's no other firearm in my inventory that can do that. So the shotgun has won me over by the fact that, yes, Joe has to quote Clint Smith. Clint, not Clint. The man is accurate. It is Clint, though.

[01:26:26] I will say that if anybody has never heard of Clint Smith, your parents deserve to be slapped. You should go to YouTube and you should search for a place called Thunder Ranch. He's an experience. Clint Smith is a national treasure. He is. But he said, with the right load at the right range, we'll remove chunks of your opponent and throw it on the wall. Shotguns are an incredibly devastating thing.

[01:26:51] And, you know, when we were talking about ammo, we didn't even talk about, like, breaching rounds, less than lethal, or any of the other stuff. Well, look, if you're going to talk less than lethals, personally, in a home defense situation, I think less than lethals are a waste of time and a liability. Because regardless of what load you put in a firearm, if you shoot it at a person, even if it is a less than lethal or less lethal,

[01:27:17] the DA is going to prosecute you as though you fired a lethal round. So you might as well use the real thing. I thought about this. I agree with you, except in one case. Sure. If you are in that unique situation where you have every legal right to send somebody to meet their maker. Sure.

[01:27:40] But it's a person you really, really, really don't want to shoot, like a child or a friend or a close family member. My friends don't usually put me in situations where I'm pulling a 12-gauge. Phil, we need to talk about your friends. Y'all are my friends, and y'all are all psychotic. But what I'm saying is, imagine yourself, if you're in that situation where I really don't want to end this person's life, but I cannot allow them to harm me or harm somebody else.

[01:28:10] In that narrow situation, I can justify less than lethal ammo because I am well within my legal rights to send them to meet Jesus. I really don't want to kill them unless I have to. That's fair. And I admit that is a very narrow scenario, but I thought about this and thought to myself, is there any possible justification for this? And that was the one I came up with was, what if you're dealing with, like, I have a daughter.

[01:28:40] Let's say I have a crazy-ass ex-boyfriend who's trying to break in through the front door. Daughter doesn't want me to shoot him. I might not want to shoot him unless he's a dirtbag, in which case he'd already be occupying a hole in the backyard. But what if I'm in that situation where this person is trying to force entry to my home? Let's say they're having a psychotic break. They're having a mental issue. They're off their meds. I know this person would not want to harm me under normal circumstances, but given the unique situation, I have to stop them.

[01:29:10] I don't want to kill them if I don't have to. In that narrow circumstance, I can see less lethal ammo because that's the way the police officers use it. But within their use of force and within their force continuum, they are authorized to use this ammo. They really don't want to kill you if they don't have to. My biggest problem with that is most less lethal ammos will not reliably cycle a semi-auto shotgun. True.

[01:29:40] And that's why I have one to two other officers backing you up at home with lethal weapons drawn. That is the other side of that equation, unfortunately. So if it doesn't work and your shotgun does not cycle, what are your options? Now you have to do an emergency reload. How fast can you emergency reload? In a team-based situation with other officers, makes sense.

[01:30:10] Totally understandable. It is, if I ever, and I really hope this never occurs, I'm in a home defense situation, I do not have a team backing me up. I have my wife on the phone with 911. I have me and whatever's in my hands. I don't have a backstop. I am the backstop.

[01:30:35] So, to me, if I am taking the choice of a lethal option, of which shotguns are a very lethal option, we're not playing around with less than lethals anymore. No, that's a perfectly fair argument. I'm just, I really racked my brain to try to figure out, like, is what, what is that use case for less than lethal? And that's the only thing I can come up with.

[01:31:01] And, again, I put myself in that position of, like, if it was my daughter having a psychotic break. Sure. I would roll the dice on less than lethal. Absolutely. If I had children, I could understand that. Honestly, I would probably roll the dice on trying to subdue her with my bare hands and not even have to use the shotgun. Like, I would figure out, I would be willing to put myself at risk of substantial harm to not have to end her life. Yeah. Oh, I agree.

[01:31:28] But at that point, I'm not a father. Yeah, I'm not. I don't have children. If I did, I can understand that. But at that point, I probably am not grabbing a shotgun. I am probably going to go hands on. Yeah. If it was my child or, like, a niece and nephew. I'm a pretty big, strong guy. I don't like most of my nieces and nephews that much. Yeah, I know. But I don't have any of those either.

[01:31:58] The only one that's on the way has not been born yet. So I'm pretty sure I can overpower a fetus. Yeah, pretty sure. Pretty sure. I'm a pretty big guy. I lift heavy things a lot. I'm fairly certain I can handle a fetus or a young teenager. That's probably not going to be a problem in a hands-on situation, even if they had a weapon. I mean, unless they have a firearm, in which case we have escalated well beyond reasonable.

[01:32:29] You know, before we walk this one out, this is another good one. There's a loose bull in the yard you want to drive off. Yeah, I mean, if nothing else, use less lethal for animal control, where you just need something to get the hell out of your yard without killing it. That is, you know, I did not think of animal control. That is very reasonable. Because there are very few animals that when you whack them with something, aren't going to run off. Yep. All right. Well, I guess let's go ahead and start working this one out the door.

[01:32:55] I mean, we could sit here for another half an hour and think of what we missed when it comes to shotguns. I mean, I feel like it's a big topic. Not many things. The spread's pretty good. Yeah. But I do want to find somebody we can bring on to, like, talk the topic a little bit that has a bit more experience. I just, like, what has captivated me about shotguns is that it's the ability to put, see, and see, I haven't taken a professional shotgun class. You have.

[01:33:22] To me, it is 110% the payload delivery capability of a 12-gauge relative to a variety of firearms I've handled, most of which I can't play with anymore because, you know, NFA tax stamps and government regulation and things like that. But the point remains, it's the ability to put more violence on target than anything else in my safe at very reasonable home defense ranges. It's an impressive payload delivery system that I've really taken to.

[01:33:52] I think that for the person out there that, especially if you live in a state where, like, frankly, you need to toss your politicians into a volcano because they keep passing gun control laws. But if you're in that place where, you know, I don't want to give Uncle Joe his due, but that 12-gauge makes a hell of an argument. If you're in a place where an AR-15 can't. And I would say that I have both of those options available to me.

[01:34:23] I think at this point, if I didn't need to run night vision, I might grab the shotgun first. Single trigger pull efficacy? In a home situation, at home ranges, shotgun is probably going to be more lethal faster. Yeah.

[01:34:39] You know, fortunately or unfortunately, however you want to look at that, I try to decide on the most effective tool for the job in the least time possible. That's why I have a Sawzall for when I do demo work. And shotgun, it's awful hard to argue with a one-ounce payload. It does seem to solve the argument.

[01:35:05] I mean, even if someone's wearing armor, the energy delivered on target is enough to at least make them question their life choices. Yeah. Anybody that wants to argue that, just Google backface defamation. Yeah. It ain't going to penetrate the armor. No. Because it's going to make you miserable. But it's going to smash the armor up against things that aren't made of steel or ceramic. Put it that way.

[01:35:35] All right. Let's go ahead and punt this one out the door. Matter of fact, this is my boomstick. And if you haven't bought a shotgun yet, you should probably consider that. And if you have bought a shotgun and you have not committed a war crime by putting a red dot on it, then I'm going to judge you out loud repeatedly until you give in. Because that's the treatment I got from all of you sadists out there when I put off buying a shotgun for this long until you finally shame me into it. So now I'm going to return the favor.

[01:36:05] Good. We deserve it. Matter of fact, it's going out the door. Good night, everybody. Night. Night.