A free copy of The Perfect Pistol Shot will be awarded to the first blogger to answer the following question correctly: Which of the four fundamentals of marksmanship is the most important (sighting, trigger control and grip, body alignment and natural point of aim, or breathing)?  The contest ends February 28, 2012.

A couple of nights ago, I watched a cable show in which a pistol expert demonstrated how to draw a duty weapon. The technique was this thurst forward nonsense you see in all the handgun magazines. The thinking goes that if the shooter draws the weapon straight upward from the holster, toward the arm pit, and then thrusts it straight forward, sighting will be more quickly acquired. The turth is, when the weapon is drawn and moved into line with eye, at about a 45 degree angle, sight and target acquistion will be both quicker and less disturbed by unneccessary muscle involvement. Candidly, so much of what is represented as "good tactics" is just gimmicks that involve television poses (and always the SWAT guy scowl), which are counter-productive to good marksmanship and personal safety. All that huffing and puffing and thrusting and squating does nothing for putting rounds on target. In fact, such practices are prone to do the opposite. The gun crowd has always been susceptible to fashion concerning weapon and ammo choices. Now it seems even tactics are judged by "looks" rather than effect.

Amazon.com has just ordered The Perfect Pistol Shot from Paladin Press. They don't have the books or cover photo yet but customers may now place orders from the Amazon.com web site.