The Prepper Broadcasting Network - Matter of Facts: Razorwire Is A Vibe

Episode Date: January 29, 2024

http://www.mofpodcast.com/www.pbnfamily.comhttps://www.facebook.com/matteroffactspodcast/https://www.facebook.com/groups/mofpodcastgroup/https://rumble.com/user/Mofpodcastwww.youtube.com/user/philrabhttps://www.instagram.com/mofpodcasthttps://twitter.com/themofpodcastSupport the showMerch at: https://southerngalscrafts.myshopify.com/Shop at Amazon: http://amzn.to/2ora9riPatreon: https://www.patreon.com/mofpodcastPurchase American Insurgent by Phil Rabalais: https://amzn.to/2FvSLMLShop at MantisX: http://www.mantisx.com/ref?id=173*The views and opinions of guests do not reflect the opinions of Phil Rabalais, Andrew Bobo, or the Matter of Facts Podcast*The MoF boys sit down to talk about the chaos at the southern border, then detour to a humorous discussion about some of the silliness that exists in the firearms aftermarket.Matter of Facts is now live-streaming our podcast on YouTube channel, Facebook page, and Rumble. See the links above, join in the live chat, and see the faces behind the voices. Intro and Outro Music by Phil Rabalais All rights reserved, no commercial or non-commercial use without permission of creator prepper, prep, preparedness, prepared, emergency, survival, survive, self defense, 2nd amendment, 2a, gun rights, constitution, individual rights, train like you fight, firearms training, medical training, matter of facts podcast, mof podcast, reloading, handloading, ammo, ammunition, bullets, magazines, ar-15, ak-47, cz 75, cz, cz scorpion, bugout, bugout bag, get home bag, military, tactical

Welcome back to the MatterFacts 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 mofpodcast.com on Facebook or Instagram. You can support us via Patreon or by checking out our affiliate partners. I'm your host, Phil Rabelais, and my co-host Andrew Bobo is on the other side of the mic, and here's your show. Welcome back to the MatterFacts Podcast. It is like 8.01 on a Friday morning and for that I apologize. We already have people in the comment section grousing about the hour of the morning and God Almighty if they're watching this on YouTube,

Rumble, or X, or Facebook, they're seeing my very swollen morning face and they're going to complain about that too, I sure but good morning andrew hi so the reason we are you're complaining you're complaining i've only slept for like two and a half hours stop complaining i'm i'm complaining about everybody else complaining i'm not complaining about the hour of the morning on according to army time i should have already been awake awake and PT'd and had my breakfast by now. Like 8 o'clock is, no, 8 o'clock is, I would already be awake and at work for several hours by now. But we are here on this glorious Friday morning to talk about two topics.

One of which being the insanity that is happening on our southern border right now, and then we're going to have a fun topic, talk about stupid gun stuff. Raggle fraggle, I sympathize that you're at work, and being at work by default means you're unhappy, but I hope you're getting paid at least. That won't make the unhappiness any less, but maybe it helps soothe it very slightly. So, Andrew, let's start off with the obvious. On my end of the country, there's some spice going on right now. Everybody's probably well aware, and if you're not aware, then I don't know. You would do a much better job of staying out of current events than I do.

But Texas has recently told the federal government to kick rocks over its lack of action on southern border and immigration check. It has kicked all of Border Patrol agents out of one of their substations. It has strung up razor wire along the border right there. up razor wire along the border right there. The short version of this story is that the federal government took them to court to find out if they could remove the razor wire, which, thank you, Amy Coney Barrett, you freaking backstabbing pain in my ass, told the federal government, yes, you may, which I think was a massive, massive lapse of judgment. I think was a massive, massive lapse of judgment. And so the federal government has given Texas 24 hours to get out of the way and let them resume operations as normal, to which Governor Abbott told them in a very polite and eloquently worded letter, told them to go stuff themselves.

And then strung up more razor wire along the southern border. Is that a pretty accurate depiction of the last 72 hours and where we're at right now, Andrew? Because it's been a lot. Yeah. Yesterday, basically, the federal government gave Texas till today to allow the feds into Eagle Pass to start removing the razor wire and from everything that I've been

picking up, just researching it here, the next day it looks like Greg Abbott was like nope, we're going to put up more razor wire. So that's going gonna be interesting um and 20 was it 21 25 now republican governors have pledged support uh a lot have are actually sending down um from what i've read there are some other there are multiple states that are sending support um sending supplies and they're also i've been reading that some of them are sending their own National Guard down. we were talking about before the show the federal government they're not going to want to blink because god forbid a state uh protect its own borders uh which it should be it's right which

i mean it is it's right but uh yeah they're they're pissed because they can't the the governor you know governor abbott is stopping illegals from entering, which it's insane to me. I mean, that's crazy to me. It's the amount of illegals I've gotten through this year. I mean, it's always been a problem, but the amount that have gotten through this year, videos that you've seen, videos of the caravans coming up through the through the different countries and stuff like that through Central America and the videos that you see of them beat with the ones that are caught and everything I mean they're military age males I mean yeah there's are there there's there's a handful of women and children and stuff like that but the amount of military age males and the

videos that I've been seeing of them saying, where are you going? And people, and they're, you know, I'm going to New York. I'm going to, I'm going to Chicago. I'm going to California. I'm like, they have set destinations of where they're going. Uh, it's, it's concerning. I mean, this is like, I, I'm all for, I'm a hundred percent in agreement. This isn't an invasion. And what cracks me up is the administration over the last four years really or three years and some change they've sent how many billions of dollars to ukraine to fight off an invading army crossing their border but yet we have an invading army crossing our border and they're just like nah wide open i mean granted an invading army crossing our border and they're just like, nah, wide open.

I mean, granted, the invading army, you know, Russia is shooting and, you know, they were bombing and stuff like that. But it's still, I still look at it as almost the same thing is it's an invading army, military males. Why are they, why is it just men coming into the country? That makes zero sense i can understand you know back in the day you had you know men crossing the border and everything trying to work and provide money for the family sending back but nah it's there's something else going on i don't know i mean we can put our tinfoil hats on and what's what the possibility of what's going to happen but it it's too coincidental especially just the different countries that they're catching i mean they're catching they're

they're catching chinese immigrants they're catching people from south america they're catching people for you know they're catching people from all over not just you know guatemala and you know mexico and stuff like that it's they're catching up from all over the place that they've traveled a very long ways to cross the border. So why? Those are questions that beg answers from anybody who isn't just rabidly trying to get people shoved into this country for nefarious reasons. But I mean, let's, let's, let's expound upon that a little bit. What I keep hearing over and over and over is that, like, how dare we, after these people have survived this incredibly long, dangerous journey, how dare we not offer them a cot and a meal and take care of them?

But to which I reply, like you just said, some of these people have hopped through four or five different countries to get here. Why didn't those other four or five countries have the same duty? Why is it that we are fighting tooth and nail to defend our southern border against the efforts of multiple entities, while at the same time Mexico is taking no action to keep these people from getting into its own country or keep these people from crossing the Rio Grande, which we all admit, no, anybody from this part of the country knows that's not a river to play with. and we have mostly military age males, but yeah, certainly some women and children trying to cross this thing. Why doesn't Mexico string a razor bar on their side of it to keep these people out? Because they don't want to deal with the problem. They want to export it to us. And let's call it what it is. Most of that is because human smuggling is an incredibly lucrative business. Coyotes are all up and down the southern border. That's well

understood. And the cartels basically own the Mexican government. They pay them off or just disappear them into an oil drum in the middle of the desert if they don't cooperate. I mean, it is what it is. We're dealing with a situation where our neighbor to the south is so corrupt and is so corrupt bull that they are if not incentivizing and if not if not assisting they're certainly allowing this to become our problem they're taking no effort on their own behalf to try to help us deal with this problem because as long as the migrants make it to the u.s it's's not their issue. And they're happy with that. And furthermore, the cartels are very happy to have these people showing up in Mexico because it's a money-making opportunity for them to get these people over the border and make some cash. And newsflash, not all of them make it across the border. Some of them

just disappear, but they still get the money. And the cartels are going to deal with the Mexican federalities and the government any way they have to, to keep that money supply rolling. That's just the way it is. And then on our side of the situation, we have people in this country who are hell bent on importing as many people as possible of any nationality and for any reason they possibly can into specific congressional districts so they can increase the number of reps those districts get. Anybody wants to argue that point that illegals can't vote? They don't have to. Census, all they have to do is say, I live here, and the Census Bureau picks them up. And that is how congressional districts are redrawn.

So if you have a tiny little, if you have a small Democrat district and you wanted to have more voting power, all you have to do is get enough people into there that that district gets more seats. And then those handful of Democrats now have more power than their numbers would otherwise infer. Like that's a well-understood principle. Anybody wants to argue it, go for it, but I'm just telling you the way this works. I don't know if that's the reason for this insanity that we're seeing, but it's certainly one explanation. But at the end of the day, to me, this is like a very simple, this is a very simple premise that Texas has a responsibility to its citizens, very similar to what I think the federal government has a responsibility to its citizens.

Its duty is to defend the country, to defend the citizenry. And with the federal government very obviously abrogating its duty to do so, if not wholly working against it, I don't see where Texas has a choice. My only frustration is that Governor Abbott has sat with his thumb in his butt for this many years and allowed this to happen, and only now, in an election year, is he taking action. Well, and then he, so that's the thing, is Abbott, Abbott has been getting some flack, I've been reading, because's known for sitting on issues

basically until it either gets too bad to where he's forced to do something or timing when it looks good. So is this a political stunt? I mean, it very well could be, but at the same time, but that's the other thing too, is we have a ton of Republican governors. We have a bunch of Republicans in the House and the Senate that are backing this. And the thing is though, is it's an election year. So, so what's, you know, so really what's going on? Are they, are they doing it for the American good, for the people, for the country,

or are they doing it for polling numbers and to get elected, get back into office? I'll take option B. Well, no, I know that, but I'm just saying, so after the election year, is this going to go basically get swept back under the rug, collect the razor wire, and go home, go about your day? So they get basically swept back under the rug, collect the razor wire and go home, go about your day. But I mean, that's the thing is, I mean, I'm sure I'm pretty sure it's option B a hundred percent, but the idea that it's like, okay, they're finally doing something. It's, it's good. And in the fact that multiple other States are sending guard and they're sending supplies and stuff like that. And, I mean, I've never heard, I mean, I know we've talked about the whole Second Amendment, or Second Civil War happening, the possibility of it happening, how would it happen, stuff like that.

And, honestly, when was the last time you saw this many states come together against the federal government? I mean, and what happened? I mean, that's the thing is I've set up time and time again. The United States was a good experiment. The USA has been a great experiment, but I think it's time to secede. It's time to balkanize. And I don't think that the founding father, I mean, I feel bad for what the founding fathers had in plan,

that it didn't work, and it only worked for about 250 years. And it's a good experiment, but let's just call it what it is. I mean, it's a failed experiment. So where do we go from here, though? So I have thoughts. First of all, I have argued in the past, and I will continue to argue, that America has actually seen two civil wars in our history already. Once was in 1776. already, once was in 1776. Because, like I'm very fond of pointing out, that we call it the American Revolution, but the American Revolution was literally the people of the Americas, the

colonists fighting against their government. And I don't know what else you call that other than a civil war, because there were literally colonials that were loyalists fighting with the redcoats against their own people and that is by definition a civil war i mean hell george washington was a commissioned member of the king's army before he you know led the before he led the colonial militias so i would argue we've already had two civil wars all All right. Well, but still, though, I mean, that's a mute point when you're – okay, so in this way, you're leading the third civil war. But the reason I'm saying it that way is because you asked what happens from here. So let's look back in the past. The first civil war was fought.

Why? Because we were having taxes and legislation imposed upon us with no representation. The people's will was not being heard. And as a result, the people no longer felt they had a duty to permit the king to govern them. The governed must consent to be governed. It's a very basic principle in mostly in our history. Like a lot of other nations didn't come around to this way of thinking until after Americans did. But we culturally have always had this idea that the people must consent to be governed.

You cannot govern by force. You cannot govern by threat. Sooner or later, people have to say, I am willing to allow this because there's 320, 330 million of us and how many Feds? 320, 330 million of us and how many feds. If they say do this and 330 million people say kick rocks, that's the end of the discussion. It's not going to happen. The people have to be said to be governed. And as a result, the government must allow the people input into that process. King George didn't. Things got spicy. Like, yes, Lexington and Concord and the attempt to seize the munitions of the militia might have been what kick-started the first American Civil War, the Revolutionary War, but the ember that started that fire, in my opinion, was the people no longer

consented to be governed. Then we look at the U.S. Civil War, or the Second Civil War. What happened? Two-thirds of the country got together and voted against the interest of the other third. I understand it was slavery. Stick with me on this. I'm not saying slavery was a good thing. I personally think if we hadn't had a Civil War, give it about another 20 years, and slavery as an institution would have died off anyway because things were being invented to allow mechanized harvesting that were, quite frankly, making slave labor so inefficient it was going to collapse under its own weight eventually anyway. But that's a whole other historical discussion to have. But the people of the Confederacy no longer felt as though their government was listening to them. So they took their ball and they went home.

They rescinded their consent to be governed by that government. So where are we now? We are now in a situation where 25 states are telling the federal government, we do not consent to allow you to secure our southern border because you're not doing it. We're right back in the exact same situation that caused two other civil wars, where the federal government or any government is not listening to the will of the people and the people are getting impatient and pissed. And once the people finally tell the Fed, kick rocks, I'm going to do what I want

anyway, we're right back in the same situation that spawned two other civil wars. It's just a question of when does it become kinetic? Or does somebody let the air out of the balloon and think with a cooler head and realize, damn, the people are really unhappy, we probably need to start listening to them. That's why i bring up past conflicts because i feel like there's there's there's enough parallels there that everybody should be really really worried well that's the thing though is and i mean we've seen it with this administration with uh the amount of money that they're shelling out to other governments. I mean, there's been more to protect other countries than there has been to protect the United States.

That's what I feel like, and the talks I've seen, the people I've talked to uh something just questions around just socially and stuff like that it's it's the same feeling there's been more to protect the ukraine border or the people of ukraine there's been more to protect israel there's been more to protect other countries more has been done than for here uh it's been more like the people the united states of america like a lot we feel forgotten from our from our own administration granted what however whatever check mark you want to put you know whatever d or r or i or whatever you want to put next to your name we all i feel like it's almost the same feeling across the board. It's the government is not doing what they're supposed to be doing.

If anything, they're going completely the opposite direction. I mean, they're, instead of protecting the people, they're trying to pass stuff like gun control. They're trying to pass, I mean, basically look at our constitution, our bill of rights. They're trying to pass things every single day. Both sides are trying to pass it to go against the people, and they're not doing anything for the people. And that's the thing is going with the whole Texas thing. It's like, okay, well, where's that line?

So what's going to happen? And if it goes kinetic, that's going to be really interesting. Because, I mean, basically we were seeing the federal government coming in they're trying to pick the razor wire up and the the texas national guard is basically just putting more down right behind them and it's like all right well here you go so i don't know it's going to be interesting it's going to be something that to continue to watch because i don't think i don't see abbott blinking and i don't and the people of texas i really feel like are backing them and i mean there's been a lot of different i mean a lot

of people are backing them because of the amount of crap and the amount of stuff that's been going on with the with these illegal immigrants and the idea that there's been some like rapes and all that stuff that's been uh in different cities that these are getting but these people are getting bused to it's those numbers are going up and i mean there was one where it was a guy there was an immigrant that was just he he was uh he was arrested and released under the i think but from the liberal judge and then he he murdered he uh killed somebody and that family is suing the biden administration over it yeah and as they should they should sue for everything they like sue the freaking administration out of existence

but i mean but that's the thing and but it's all taxpayer money i mean they'll get a settlement but it would be our money that's going to them. The taxpayer money, nothing will happen. No money will get taken out of fricking the Biden's pocket or whatever. I mean, it's, it's crazy. It's, it's frustrating. Yeah. But I agree.

Something needs to happen. And I'm, I'm okay with the extent. I mean, shit, I say landmine the fricking area. I'm okay with the extent, I mean, shit, I say landmine the freaking area. Freaking, you know, people are pissed off because it, you know, supposedly what kicked this off was the, there was a family. It was a mother and I think two children, three children, or let me find it again. It was a mother and two young children are drowning in the Rio Grande while trying to to seek asylum in the united states that's the that's the headline the feel-good headline uh that you've been that i've been seen and yeah granted okay it sucks i'm it's sad that they that they drown but you shouldn't have been coming here. Like, legally, go through the legal process and, you know, and seek an asylum.

Anybody that you can make this, you can make a stupid reason for anything and you can say I'm seeking asylum. And I, our immigration system is broken. Hands down, it's broken. it's broken. I know people who have been, they, for years, they've been going through the legal process, spending thousands of thousands of thousands of dollars to get legally to go through the process. And, you know, the, the, the, so yeah, our system is broken. I mean, so, and it needs to be redone. And I know there's been talk about it, but that's all it is. It's talk. It's never moved past that.

And neither side can come up with a good thing because you have the Democrats who are pushing path of citizenship, which includes every single freaking immigrant or illegal that's in the United States right now. that's in the United States right now, oh, we want to give them a path of citizenship, which includes just canning them over a visa and stuff like that and citizenship. Well, no, they should go back to their country and they should actually, if they don't have the proper visas and stuff like that, the work visas or married visas, whatever ones you want to call it the legal way, they need to go through the legal process, not just handed away. Just not, don't just hand them a free, uh,

you know, a free ticket. And that's what this comes down to is that's what I feel like. And that's what it, the reading I've been doing, that's what it just sounds like it's happening is they're just getting a free ticket. And it's like,

ah, what does, I mean, look at California, what they just passed. So, yeah, I don't know. It, it's going, ah, what does, I mean, look at California, what they just passed. So, yeah, I don't know. It's going to be interesting. It's going to be something to keep an eye on,

especially since more states are sending more and more of their own guard down. And, yeah, I mean, especially, I mean, the other thing, too, is it's kind of scary because you have, now you have U.S., you know, like, congressmen and stuff. They're calling for the federalization of the National Guard. Yeah. Like, okay, like, if you want to dig into something spicy, dig into that. What does that mean? You know, and all that stuff.

So it'll be interesting. And see, when I heard about this, this kind of got my gears turning. Because, like, obviously there are legal mechanisms in place to allow the federal government to temporarily take control of the state's National Guard. And I was never high enough up in the National Guard to know. No, I don't think there's at least I personally like in my in my lifetime, I cannot recall a time when the federal government tried to call a National Guard to action and there was any pushback. So that tells me one of two things. I don't know that that's the case because it – that – I can't imagine any state would have permitted that when the last Militia Act was passed, which I think was in like 19 – it was in the 20th century, I remember. That was what created the National Guard and separated it from the unorganized militia, which is ostensibly everybody else. else. And I can't imagine states would have given up the ability to control their own National Guard, especially considering that, you know, during the 95% of time that the National Guard isn't under federal orders, they're funded by and trained by the state dollars. So it's kind of

like, why on earth would I, why on earth would I pay full freight for this National Guard, which is ostensibly meant to protect my own state, but then the federal government can take them away from me at will? I can't see that being the way. So I don't – I think probably if the federal government tried to strong-arm Texas by quote-un unquote federalizing or taking away the National Guard? I don't know. I mean, even if the leadership of the National Guard went along with that, and I don't think that'd be in their best interest because sooner or later they're going to back under state control and there'll be a reckoning at that moment. But I don't know that the rank and file would tolerate that because like, you know, somebody pointed out the other day in another podcast I was listening to just trying to stay abreast of what's going on. But like the National Guard is a very different on the face of it. It might look like a very similar organization to the Army Reserve or the for the active duty army, but it's not culturally like National Guards are always composed of, you know, like local citizens.

Like when I was when I was in the National Guard, my unit was down in New Orleans. I lived on the North Shore Lake Pontchartrain. It was only a 35, 40 minute drive to get to my unit. So that gives you an idea of about the radius you're dealing with. Like we had people from as far south as Homo, which is a good bit down towards the Gulf of Mexico, but like it was still people from southern Louisiana. So when we got deployed after Hurricane Katrina, we were literally like driving through areas we had been at.

You know what I'm saying? Like we were driving through neighborhoods we recognized. We were driving by businesses we used to eat at or get a coffee at or whatever. We were in our own home neighborhoods in some cases. And those were the areas we to take the orders of the federal government that contravene my own governors. You know what I'm saying? Like that? Mm-hmm. Like just as like an emotional response, I would – that would – I'd be at loggerheads with myself on that almost immediately. And I have to imagine it'd be that way for most of the Texas National Guard.

If the federal government said, you're our troops, do what we say, I don't think that would end well. And unfortunately, right now, the Biden administration is in this weird situation because you and I were talking about this. This is like Power Dynamics 101, but an entity cannot tolerate an affront to its own authority. It can't because if you do, that authority is diminished. So the Biden administration is in this weird situation where they are picking – they are continuing to escalate a fight with another entity that has told them in no uncertain terms, kick rocks, get over yourself, we're not doing what you say, and they can't back down. Because if they back down, it shatters their – it shatters the pretense of their authority.

Their authority to push back against federal government has been horribly diminished, but then their authority to their own people has been horribly diminished. You know what I'm saying? Like it becomes very obvious at that point. The governor is inept. He won't defend his state. And now you have a situation – like I feel like in this situation, Texas has – the government of Texas has more to lose because the people of Texas have pretty much given up on the federal government trying to control illegal immigration. I think most of the country has at this point. So the only thing that's keeping the people of Texas glued together is the state government is doing something finally.

And if that stops, I don't know where this ends. You might wind up with people just taking the law into their own hands, which I don't have to tell you how incredibly dangerous that could get, how quickly. So like, I don't know how they, who lets the air out of this balloon first? We'll have to wait and see. All I know is that we've gotten to this point because we have two things. We have a federal government that has on multiple occasions refused to faithfully discharge the law, which is the whole point, the whole duty of the executive branch, by the way. They don't make the laws. They don't determine the constitutionality laws. They enforce the laws, and they have refused to do that for years. And then on the flip side of things, we have a state government who has sat here with their thumb in their butt for years,

until an election year, and allowed this problem to propagate. If you could deploy the Texas National Guard now, you could have done it a couple of years ago. And this is not the first time Greg Abbott has come under fire for inaction from the governor's office, because this exact same thing got lodged when we were coming out of COVID. When he started pushing back against masking, when he started pushing back against school closures, and everybody said, where the hell have you been for a year? You allowed this to happen. And only now that as soon as the wind shifted and Ron DeSantis in Florida started pushing back, so did Greg Abbott in Texas. And that's a very fair criticism, by the way. If you take action now, what changed? And it's not like public opinion changed because public opinion has been about what it was

all along. There's this many people that think the border should be open and this many people that think it should be closed. That metric has not changed. And you can't say that, well, it's finally gotten so bad we have to deal with it because it's been this bad for months. What changed? I think what changed is it's election season, so now we have to be seen doing what we're doing. I think what changed is it's election season, so now we have to be seen doing what we're doing. So this is one of those moments where, like, I can dog a politician out for doing the right thing for the wrong damn reasons at the wrong time.

That's well within my purview and well within my bag of tricks. I'm known for that. Like, the beautiful thing about being people that are like-minded with us is I can vote for a person and think he's a scumbag exactly the same time. Those are not mutually exclusive. And quite frankly, all politicians are scumbags on some level, so you should never trust any of them. It's the only way to be sure. But the other thing I want to bring up, because you brought up tax dollars and it got my gears turning, let's think about the priorities of the federal government. They're handing cash payments and cell phones and bus tickets to, I don't like to call them illegal immigrants, that's sugarcoating it, invaders. People that invaded this country, they're giving them assistance. Giving assistance to people that are breaking the law is conspiracy

to violate that same law. And the federal government and Border Patrol, I think, are probably guilty of that at this stage. That's not going to be a popular sentiment in all corners. Get over yourselves. I'm just telling you that that's one person's interpretation of what the law says. When you help somebody violate the law, things happen. That's happening. The federal government is hell-bent on giving military aid and humanitarian aid to Ukraine. They're hell-bent on giving humanitarian aid to Hamas. But then we have

situations like Palestine, Ohio, and we have situations like what happened in Maui, where U.S. citizens were devastated. And Palestine, Ohio basically got told, what, figure your own lives out and Maui got, their people got $700 checks who lost everything. We're in a situation where our government is 110% focused

on helping everybody out, except for its own people. And I have issues with that. But I think that's enough of dogging on the federal government about a completely screwed up worldview and absolutely no proper action taken on, you know, the southern border. I don't know where this ends, Andrew. I know that at least so far, you've got the unstoppable force and the immovable object and they're aimed at each other and we're going to wait and see who blinks first. But how about we talk about some stupid gun stuff?

I mean, that's fitting since SHOT Show is ending right now. Yes, I thought about that. I mean, that's fitting since SHOT Show is ending right now. Yes, I thought about that. Okay, so context. Every year at this time of year, there are certain other content creators I stop watching altogether. And I pick them back up in a couple of weeks. Like, all of the flood of SHOT Show shoot for nargans just drives me up the wall.

Like, I just, it's overload and i don't care i mean i mean it's there's a couple ones that i i keep like classic firearms uh i watch them they've got really good coverage of shot uh but uh no i mean there are there's there's some good there's some interesting products coming out. Anything really innovative, I don't really think so. I had to laugh because I was watching, I think it was Classic Firearms with Trijicon. And they were talking about the new RMR HD and the RCR and stuff like that. And I had to laugh because the guy was like what's the price point on these and he goes the guy was like 849 i think is what the that's retail i mean you

can find them for a lot cheaper uh but he goes 849 the guy was like you heard it here first and i'm like wait these have been out for a while now like they've been out for a couple months so you know we did not hear here first it's a known thing how much they are but uh no it there are some interesting things coming up and i think we should i think it'd be good uh to have duncan on uh who we all know from us night vision uh he was there and i i'm still unpacking some of the information that came through so i think we're gonna have a shot show show in a way, even though we weren't there, but some interesting products that kind of came out and stuff like that.

So, yeah, it'll be interesting. But anyway, yeah, useless gun accessories. Go for it. Okay, so now this is just one person's opinion, and if you own any of these things, I still love you, but I'm judging you a little bit. So let's start off with the least egregious thing on my list, the magpied. Now, for anybody that doesn't know or anybody that's listening to this, so you can't see the pictures I'm throwing up on the screen if you're watching the stream,

this is that thing that replaces the floor plate on your magazine that kind of tries to turn your magazine into a monopod. tries to turn your magazine into a monopod. And I personally think it's a little ridiculous, because like I told Andrew, I'm like, you know, we learned how to do this in Baystream without magpods on GI mags. I guess this falls under the heading of, I just don't see the point in it. Although Andrew swears up and down that there are situations where this might come in handy. Barricade shooting?

I mean, I don't swear up and down about it. It's just I've seen people have those, and during training and stuff like that, it just gives you a better purchase point. Kind of like the, I can't think of what they're called, not ranger bands. That's something completely different. But basically, yeah, the whole idea behind it that I've seen people utilize is, yeah, I don't think I've ever really seen anybody use them for what this picture is. It's like stuffing it into the ground.

But it's more of just a better purchase point, something to grab onto, something extended. But do I have them? No. Will I get one no i think you're thinking of magpul's to help you like get them out of your kit yeah the magpul's i've seen those but i've also seen these okay i've seen the i've seen these more than i've seen the the little loop that you can get uh to put on i've seen people alter magazines and actually just put paracord uh in there um but i've also seen the thing

was it magpul or whoever makes them they just it stuffs right on the magazine and it has like a little loop uh but again i've never i've never seen those in trainings that i've been in it's i've seen more of these than anything and a lot of the times it's it's been used for just a purchase point to grab onto and pull your mag. Yeah. But again, do I have one? No. Am I going to get one?

No. And see the commercial mag pulls crack me up because I come from that generation that remembers guys literally like with a strip of green duct tape around the bottom of their GI mags and a little loop of 550 cord. Like that's, that's where the mag pull comes from. It's something guys were doing in theater. And then Magpul was like,

there's an interesting idea. So anyway. So next up on the list, the Mule stock. This is the AR stock that you shove your handgun into. And I mean, they could have used a better pistol than the freaking xd i don't care

what pistol it is this is one of the most belligerently dumb ideas i've ever seen in my life and i don't know what anybody was ever thinking when they came up with this like it just like there's so many really great reasons not to do this let's start with the fact that like the whole point of having a secondary weapon is that it is separate from your primary weapon so that the primary weapon gets damaged or goes down or like you get hung up and you have to cut the sling and dump it then you've got your secondary and that's the other thing is that like in in in operational use, if you have a rifle and a pistol, the pistol stays on you. Because if ever there's a moment where administratively like you shed your you shed your your vest and you shed your rifle for some reason, you've still got your pistol belt and like bare minimum stuff around your waist to fight your way back to your rifle.

That's the entire idea. So taking your secondary weapon and literally stuffing it into the butthole of your rifle stock just to me seems like an incredibly, incredibly dumb idea. And I can see no upside to it whatsoever. I mean, do they advertise it as your secondary? I think they mostly advertised it. Because why can't it be a third backup weapon? Okay.

Why does it have to be? So now we're just adding like an extra, what, pound and a half to the buttstock of an AR-15. I'm just saying, if you're going to add this chunky-ass thing, you have your secondary on you, and then you have a smaller pistol in here, something subcompact or really compact, and then you put that in there, and you're good to go, man. You got to see the positives in this. No, I don't. I think this is dumb.

I think whoever came up with this was trying to find a question to justify the answer they came up with in their head. And I disapprove. Well, Mule Tactical came up with it. Well, I think they were probably snorting coke with Kel-Tec personally, but that's just me. I don't know, man. Kel-Tec personally, but that's just me. Oh, man. Kel-Tec's Sub 2000 is pretty nice. Look, I have nothing against Kel-Tec's firearms. They make phenomenal firearms, but their R&D team is almost certainly dabbling in recreational pharmaceuticals to come up with some of the stuff they do.

That's fine, but this is an example of what happens when you overdo it. You start putting guns inside of your guns. Just stop all that. Your gun inside of your gun. Soon they'll have another one. I'd rather have that space for peanut M&Ms or Skittles or something. What Mule should have done was make an MRE dispenser. There you go.

You could probably actually do that. Just remove the holster and stuff an MRE in there. There you go. You could probably actually do that. Just remove the holster and stuff an MRE in there and you're good to go. Bam-ba-lam. Tac-Sacs. I get it. I get it. This was a total Reddit gag to put a

literal truck nuts on your friggin' AR-15 or your Picatinny rail equipped firearm i get it i know this wasn't serious but god almighty is this like the worst look at all in all history for the gun community i've literally never seen these in public i've only seen them in public one time and the person that had it was exactly what what i envisioned he would look like it was unfortunate but i keep seeing these popping up on websites left and right so i mean obviously they're selling enough of them that they won't freaking die which is annoying okay pistol bayonets look i i understand

the appeal of shanking and shooting a person at the same time. It sounds like a cool vibe. But I was prepping this show this morning while my daughter was getting ready for school and she walked in and asked me a question and saw this and she's like, is that a bayonet on the front of a pistol? And I was like, yes, honey. And she was like, that is a stupid idea straight from the mouth of an 11-year-old girl. Because she was like, you know, if you had a bayonet on the end of a rifle, you'd be this far away from them.

But on the end of a pistol, you're only this far away from them. That doesn't make any sense. Which, you know, there might be a genetic link between me and that child. Just maybe. Well, what if you're clearing your house and someone comes around the corner and you've got to center punch them? Like, literally center, like, punch them. Like, literally center, like, punch them in the center of the chest with your gun.

Like muzzle, you know, muzzle strike, but instead of a muzzle, you're hitting with a knife. Okay, so are we talking about like a non-lethal center punching or a lethal center punching? Because there's this thing on a pistol called a trigger, and if you pull it, things come out of the end of it that will do more damage than a pistol bayonet and if you're talking about non-lethal

then you just take the tip of that friggin slide and just whack them right in the forehead and you'll make an impression literally do them listen I'm trying to make a reason for you to get it I don't want there to be a reason to put a bayonet on a

freaking pistol well there's a why it's america it's not america listen i will sign off on chainsaw bayonets on rifles before i sign off on this that is at least actually kind of a fun idea it's like evil dead a person you know before you mag dump into them but this is just ridiculous rag fraggle, why are all these accessories on XDs? I don't believe me. Because XD is one of the worst pistols in the freaking market. There, I said it. I don't know.

I had a first generation XD that I sold to my dad. And honestly, I never had problems with that gun. But that was before Springfield started Springfielding it. That was when it was literally just a Croatian pistol that Springfield put their name on the slide. And call it what it is. I bought that because it was like $400, and I didn't want to beat the daylights out of my Kimber, you know, throwing it in glove boxes and stuff. And that was my – I mean, bear in mind, I in mind, I bought a Kimber, and then I realized I didn't want to beat the Kimber to death.

So I got the XD, because it was an appliance. Anyway. Skeletonized receivers. Now, all of our minions understand that if you have ever used a skeletonized AR-15 receiver, I'm not mad at you.

I'm just a little disappointed because like, you know, St. Stoner created the AR-15 and it was near perfect way back in the 60s. But this cool thing is because there's not a lot of holes in the receiver, there's not a lot of ways for dirt and stuff to get into it. And when dirt and sand and rocks and grit

gets into places it's not supposed to, then your AR-15 misbehaves. So I understand somebody's going to say, well, this is just for the looks, but I don't own firearms because the way they look, I own them because, you know, defense of freedom and liberty and all that thing. So as a result, the idea of drilling holes in a firearm to allow the ingress of crap frustrates me a little bit. Can you give me that, Andrew?

No, I think it's cool. Jesus Christ in heaven. No, I think it's just to make it look cool. It doesn't look cool, though. I mean, well, because it's empty. But you have the bolt in there, and when you have everything in there, you can see through it.

I don't know. People have a fascination of wanting to see how things work. And when you see the mechanized, you know, when you see stuff like how the springs and everything like that, granted, it was like you're setting yourself up for a failure uh very very often uh but i don't know i mean again it's it's almost like okay it's one of those things where we've talked about where like bump stocks should they be around i mean that's debatable it's're cool, whatever. I mean, I'd rather have this full auto, if anything.

But am I going to curse somebody for having it? No. It's America, do what you want and build what you want, have what you want kind of thing. Is it for me? Nah, I'll probably stay away from it. Did I want one at one point? Yeah.

When they first came out with these skeletonized receivers, I was like, these are freaking cool. I would love to see what's how things work and on the inside however the practical side of my brain was like yeah but you can never like use this in a real world situation and so i did not buy it yeah to me this i'll give you that this is in the same league as bump stocks for me like i would never want never want one, and I will never own one. But if you do, then, you know, go bananas, I guess. I'm arguing with this right here. Buy a non-functional cutaway rifle.

I mean, what's the point of having a rifle if it's non-functional? Yeah, but that was his follow-up comment. To be fair, this is borderline there. And see, on a completely unrelated, selfish note, when I see this, you know the first – okay. growing out of your freaking face is that, Andrew, have you ever had that experience with a, um, with a carbine stock on an AR-15 where, because they, because there's that little gap between the stock and the buffer tube, it'll grab onto facial hair and then yank it out when you pull the, yeah, that's 10 times as bad when your beard is this long. And that thing right there, times as bad when your beard is this long and that thing right there i can just see that grabbing whole chunks of this beard and then the bulk here is something running back and forth and it basically just being like a cheese grater for my beard all right or better yet my beard get

tangled up in the fire control group right through the holes on the side of it. Now I have a whole new set of problems. I mean, we both know how far back your face is from the receiver. Are you putting your face right up against the receiver? Unless a gust of wind freaking flies up, Gandalf, you'll be fine. Which happens all the freaking time. I shoot at an outdoor range.

Look, on windy days, I usually tuck my beard down the front of my shirt to keep it out of my face okay it's a thing okay gandalf buzz off and by far and large these stupidest things in the gun in the gun world are tech stamps carry permits purchase permits and firearm registries because why on god's group aka background checks yeah absolutely none of that needs to exist for any reason whatsoever. Like, I, like me, love me, or hate me, I don't really give a damn,

but I'm that person that thinks that you ought to be able to get an AR-15, a full-auto AR-15 short barrel with a suppressor out of a vending machine on the side of the road. God almighty, if that gives you heartburn, you ought to stick around and wait. As the Founding Fathers intended. Yeah, if that gives you heartburn, stick around and ask me what I think about crew-served weapons and explosives and stuff. Like, I wish I could get C4. Oh, you mean serious putty? Mm-hmm. Or spicy putty?

Spicy Play-Doh? Yeah. But, no, yeah yeah that's the thing is that i mean that's when people argue about stupid gun accessories and the bump stocks and uh whatever you have it whatever stupid accessory you look and you're like what person thought that up we need to look at our our nfa laws we need to look at our background check system we need to look at our our NFA laws. We need to look at our background check system. We need to look at all this crap, these laws that are quote unquote put in place for public safety and for the kids. But really, if you look at them, they

serve no purpose except for disarmament of the American people. Background checks are known to be basically a back-to-registration system, which we can get into that in a whole different show. But, yeah, it's stupid stuff like that. Yeah. Well, all I'm going to say about all that is, you know, this is just my, my opinion, trying to have a little bit of fun on the show.

Cause we're allowed to do that every now and then. And if any of the things we put up, you disagree with, yeah, feel free to, you know, hop into Facebook or Instagram or wherever you happen to see this and just express your opinion.

Or if you think we missed something much stupider than anything we listed, then I'd love to hear it. I mean, I'd rather not. No, there's a lot out there. Oh, Jesus Christ. But, yeah. No, I mean, the biggest thing is, I think the biggest thing is going to be the whole Texas federal government thing.

Keep an eye on that. And obviously have your preps in order and everything ready to go. I mean, I'm not saying it's going to go that far, but hey, they've been preaching. So the conspiracy theorists have been pushing for years a Black Swan event. The conspiracy theorists have been pushing for years a Black Swan event. That's one thing when just like you have podcasts like ours, you have other people that, you know, like off the wall people some more say in stuff than just what we do when they start talking about the possibility of a black swan event and the idea that something might happen all right that that's when you should probably listen and you should probably

really start taking some things serious that something's in the works because I mean how often did they talk about a pandemic and planning stuff out before COVID hit they talked about it a few times that I can remember and there was tabletop exercises of them going through of how to shut down states and how to shut down you know businesses and how what how to restrict people's movements and all this stuff there was tabletop you can find it online you can there's there's been tabletop games that they've been playing i say games because that's pretty much what it was it was just a war game at the time that's what they try and if you look at it and what they did with covid it's like a play-by-play like exact what they did what they planned out so now that we have people we have those kind of people talking about black swan events and stuff like that i would not i would

not be surprised at all if something something were to happen well and this kind of harkens back to a conversation i had with somebody recently that they were discussing like how they were feeling burnt out about, and this was actually was going to be a topic that I have in my hopper. We'll talk about it very briefly now. But like they were talking about how they kind of got sucked into doom scrolling. You know, they were looking at the news. They were looking at all the stuff going on.

It was really causing a lot of anxiety. And they're worried about this threat, worried about this threat. And they felt like it was impacting their ability to prep because they were just kind of like chasing the rabbit in every direction. And what I point out to that person is I'm like, the difference between panic buying and prepping is intention. You don't stop prepping. If times are good, you prep. If times are bad, you prep. This is a thing we should always be doing. What we should be doing is not looking at the emergency that's happening right now, but thinking about what our need is going to be and addressing that need. So like if you've got

all the ammo you could possibly need, but not a lot of food, guess what? I don't care what's going on on the southern border. Go out and buy a bunch of food. Start figuring that out. Like do what I did a couple years ago where I cut off buying ammunition, reloaded components, firearms completely. And I got really serious about building up food stock because that's where I was weak in. And now I'm reassessing things. I'm always trying to figure out where my effort needs to go. So what I tell people in a moment like this, when you're looking at what's going on in the southern border, there is not a ton you as an individual person could do about southern border unless you want to drive to Texas and go throw your lotto with the Texas National Guard if you do more power to you. But for the rest of us, what you really need to be doing is prep every single day. Because the thing I point out to people is there is a day coming when you're

going to need it. For me, it was Hurricane Katrina. It was Hurricane Ida. It's been several natural disasters. There have been times where I had to fall back on my preps. It happens. And your day is coming too. None of us know when it is. None of us know when the Black Swan event is going to be. None of us know when it's coming. but the day it comes, it's time to go to work. So I would say that not knowing when that day is, spend every day between now and then getting ready for an emergency. And if you do that, you may not be as prepared as you want to be, but you'll be a lot more prepared than if you don't prep at all. So kick this one out the door, Andrew. Yeah. Matter of fact, it's going out the door. Good night, everybody. Bye. Thank you. We'll see you next time.