Whipped Cream Difficulties

The LAT just put up a profile of noted gunsmith Terry Tussey.

I’ve heard of Mr. Tussey before. I’ve never had any work done by him, or handled any guns he’s worked on. But he is frequently mentioned in the pages of American Handgunner. I gather that he and the editor of AH are friends.

(I’m not implying that there’s anything wrong with that. Just saying.)

I’m happy to see this kind of thing in the LAT. I’m glad anytime I see gun ownership shown positively in the media.

But there are a couple of things that give me pause.

“Assault rifles and plastic guns are machines that shoot bullets,” Tussey says. “There is a big difference between machines that shoot bullets and firearms that shoot quickly, accurately and are beautiful.”

This comes across as kind of snobbish to me, even within the full context of the article. (Tussey is referring to “two revolvers purchased online” that cost “cost under $400 apiece” and are made of “polymer and metal”. No brand name is given.)

The reference to “plastic guns” also seems odd, given that:

He keeps a loaded 9mm Glock on his workbench and a 9mm Rohrbaugh in his pocket.

And then there’s this:

Tussey is sympathetic to efforts to restrict gun ownership, but he doesn’t believe any legislation would stop gun violence.
He favors background checks and hunter safety courses, and he can’t see a purpose for assault weapons or large-capacity magazines, but he is a passionate supporter of the 2nd Amendment.

“can’t see a purpose for assault weapons or high-capacity magazines”, but “is a passionate supporter of the 2nd Amendment”. Uh-huh.

I am hesitant to jump down Mr. Tussey’s throat: it is possible that he was misquoted or misrepresented by the LAT. I’ve used the contact form at his site to ask if this is the case, and will report back if I get any response.

Two points of followup on “The War Within”:

1. The “This Ain’t Hell” blog has a post up with some good discussion of the article by people who read it before it was pulled, pointing out various bits of bullshit.
2. Speaking of reading the article before it was pulled, a source who wishes to remain anonymous provided me with a PDF of the original article. (You can also find a PDF attached to the “This Ain’t Hell” post.) Thank you, Anonymous Source! Unless and until I receive a DMCA request, you can find the article here.

Philadelphia magazine recently ran a story called “The War Within” about John P. Boudreau, a former Marine sniper “who says he’s haunted by his actions in the Middle East”.

Here’s the headline and subhead according to Google:

The War Within: Meet the Sniper Who Killed 2,200 People in Iraq

“killed 2,220 people in Iraq”? Alarm bells ringing yet? Carlos Hathcock, for comparison purposes, had 93 confirmed kills. Chuck Mawhinney is credited with 103: that makes him #1 on the Marine list. Vasily Zaytsev had 242 confirmed kills, and Simo Häyhä 505 with a rifle.

So this guy had about 22 times as many kills as Hathcock and Mawhinney, about nine times as many as Zaytsev, and four times as many as Simo Häyhä, the most bad-ass sniper ever? And nobody raised any questions: like, how did you get to 2,200 kills? After, say, kill #110, or #200, or somewhere long before #2,200, you’d think the Marines would be pulling this guy back to teach at the sniper school in Quantico (or Pendleton, or Lejeune).

So why didn’t they? And why haven’t I linked to the article yet, or even a Google cached version of it, so you can play “spot the problems” along with me?

Yep. It was all a fraud. The magazine, and the writer (a Philadelphia radio host) got suckered by Boudreau:

In a series of conversations on Wednesday and Thursday, Boudreau, who claims a residence in Chester County, acknowledged that much of what he had told Gargano over the preceding several months—information he had also confirmed to Philadelphia magazine’s fact-checker—was either embellished or flat-out fabricated.

The magazine hasn’t even been able to confirm that Boudreau was a Marine. The article has been pulled from their website. (Google returns a search result for the original article, but the article has also been pulled from Google’s cache. Bing seems to have it cached, but I can only read page 1 and the comments.)

I don’t thnk the magazine was acting in bad faith, but it does bring to mind an observation that’s not original to me. I wouldn’t suggest we abandon the all-volunteer military, but back when we had a draft, you could count on the fact that a large percentage of the population – including the guys in the newsroom – had served in the military and could spot military related bullshit when they head it. If we still had a draft, I can imagine a Philadelphia magazine editor telling the writer, “I was in the Marines as a scout sniper myself. I talked to this guy: he doesn’t even know what color the boathouse at Pendleton is.”

Layers of fact checking, indeed.

(Forgot the hattip to Lord Jim.)