The Truth About AR-15s And When Is Enough Enough?

Charlie Strickland, of the Talon Training Group, came in for his May visit and we discussed the new Talon recording studio, the constant mis (and dis) information about AR-15s (hint: it does NOT stand for Assault Rifle), and a huge story in the news which hits the topic of personal defense.

Episode Transcript

(00:13):
Alrighty, it is the third hourof the Morning Show with Preston Scott.
I'm Preston. That's grant. Greatto be with you. Show number forty
nine thirty one. As we approachshow five thousand sometime in the next few
months. Go figure. It isMay seventeenth, it's Wednesday, and that
means it's time. We are joinedby Charlie Strickland up the Talent Training Group,

(00:38):
co host of Talent Outdoors and howare you. I'm doing great this
morning? Yeah right, and earlyhad to brave the fog all the way
over from Marianna. Is Rusty theDry Creek dog with you? No,
I left Rusty and literally at thehouse with Code of my daughter's dog and
she's working from home today, AndI said, no, I'm just leaving

(01:00):
dogs here because they my little girldog, my little puppy dogs. She
likes to wet little puddles everywhere,That's what they tend to do. She
thinks the store is outside because youknow, well, I mean, you
know, there's a lot of stuffcoming in out, and she when she
needs to heal whine at the door. But dude, we get so busy

(01:22):
we just forget next thing. Youknow, I'm walking around class, you
know what, I'm gonna leave herat home. But poor little Rusty new
puppy, not new puppy anymore,but a puppy. He always feels neglected.
Anyway, how you been, I'vebeen. I have been fantastic,
been staying busy. I never know. We wake up in the mornings.
I never know if I'm going toDothan or going to Tallahassee or just gonna

(01:45):
goof off at the house, whichI don't remember last time I did that.
But I think life's good, verygood. You are moving the production
of talent outdoors to your own studios. We are, in fact, just
for a second, just could youhave ever imagined saying those words a few

(02:07):
years ago? Ah? No,no, I love it. You know,
but we've been doing our show forgoing on six years. I know.
I didn't know that until Grant didthe math one day and comes out
of We're show three oh something,and I said what? And then I
went back and looked, and apparentlyI heeart. You know, our all

(02:29):
of our shows are only I heeartout, but somehow another they get uploaded
to I found them on Spotify.I found them all the I heardest of
the one you should use, butfound them on Spotify, Audible, Amazon
Music. Three hundred and five episodesnow, which obviously pales in comparison to

(02:49):
the Great. Well, it's aweekly show versus daily and I hadn't be
doing it twenty years either. IfI'm doing this twenty years from now,
just shoot me in there we're stillaround. It's oh, come to the
talent outdoor show. Whil pressedon in. He's our guests today. If you
will be in in twenty years.Yeah, that's all that'll be about right,

(03:14):
you'll be turning the page, allright. Anyway now, it's just
it's it's awesome. And so wedecided that since we're gonna do a video
blog and we're gonna do you know, sort of a we're trying to figure
out the format of an after hourshow that's a little a little less mainstream,
you know, product evaluations and youknow, getting different guests into the

(03:36):
studio and doing the video sort ofthe sort of a Joe Rogan type thing,
but not Joe Rogan. Obviously.We want to we want our own
and so we're we took a conferenceroom that we built and never use and
I've turned it into a becoming avery nice studio. I've had to learn.
I've had a well table legs andbuild tabletops and doing decor and all

(03:59):
that kind miss and figuring out whatplugs in where we're using one of our
good friends as an it guy,and and leaning on grant Um a little
bit a lot. By the way, the reason this studio doesn't have more
than three microphones is because there's aplace for a fourth. But we learned
real quickly in the first year,and the first time we had three guests

(04:21):
in here with me, it wasa feedback trap. And you can't open
up four mics this close to eachother and survive and have volume and quality.
And then there's that giant piece ofglass that is aimed slightly at an
angle to deflect sound. And sothat's why there's not more microphones in here.

(04:44):
It's it's antisocial and well there is. I am that that's true.
So two things can be true.You're in here as the host and the
producer, and then you can havetwo guests in here easily. Yeah,
Jay and I can't have to guessNope, because there's a produc Because we
don't know anything about production. Idon't know how to open the software and

(05:08):
I can do my own commercial now, yeah, but you know, I
don't I'm like, what format?What does that? The MPa? What?
No? Is that wave? Idon't know, how do you do
that? Send me some instructions.I'm googling stuff. Charlie strickling with me
from the Talent Training Group Personal Defensesegment here on the Morning Show with Preston

(05:30):
Scott. I was, I was, I had gotten to it yet,
Charlie. The uh the gunwriter LeeWilliams, I like, Lee, I
don't know, have you ever methim? No? He writes a lot,
does a lot of advocacy on behalfof the Second Amendment as well.
But he's talked about a story hereNBC pushing fake news again about America's rifle,
and he gets back to the historyof the AAR and it's almost like

(05:53):
the worst thing that could have possiblyhappened is that that that Armament Light rifle
came out as an are armor Light. Yeah, that was the company.
Yeah, the corporate name armor Light, you know, a armor light rifle.
So Armor Light was a company,and that company actually faded and came

(06:14):
back and was rebranded and anyway there. We actually, when I was buying
rifles for the Sheriff's office here inLeon County, we bought some armor Light
brand rifles. Um, you knowthey're they're a brand. Uh. The
NBC story says, what makes theR fifteen so beloved and so reviled?
A rifle with military origins has becomethe country one of the country's most divisive

(06:38):
consumer products. It doesn't have militaryorigins, well, no, but they
they want to twist everything. Andif you take any of the rifles that
have come along during our history orthe world's history, and firearms, I
mean, militant civilian use drives militaryuse, which drives civilian use. I

(06:59):
mean as the advancements have come along. I mean most weapons over time,
other than when we were hunter gatherers, you know, were where they were.
Weapons were designed for us to beable to feed ourselves. But they
were also used as instruments of war, and they always have been. And
anytime you can you can I mean, granted, if you said, well,

(07:21):
I want an F sixteen jet,you know that's a that's not a
commute vehicle. That's not something youwant to well, I want to get
downtown in a hurry, you know, you use it for that, that
is, you know what I wouldcoins. But but um, the right
brothers didn't design the airplane as aninstrumental war. They designed it, you
know, because that was the nexttechnological thing they thought. They wanted to

(07:42):
you know, man to expand right, they wanted man to fly. Well,
then man figured out they could dropexplosive devices out of it. Well,
which which came first, the chickenor the egg? I mean,
the fact is is that an AARfifteen, a modern sporting rifle, UM
can fire a lot of rounds ina hurry if you want it to,

(08:03):
or it can be very precise ifyou want it to be. It's an
all purpose firearm. UM. Ihunt with one. My children and my
wife hunt with one. Uh No, I don't use a thirty round magazine
when I'm hunting because legally I haveto use a fire round magazine. I
can also defend my home or myselfwith one. I carry one for defense,
and so I can utilize one firearm. I use one and a six

(08:28):
two or a three or eight caliber, you know, and I can hunt
with it and I can defend myselfwith it. So no, it's not
it's not a weapon of war.It's a weapon of self defense if you
want to call it that, youknow, but I have a right to
have that because you know, that'sthat's what I want it for. I
don't plan on going to battle unlessnecessary, I do. I do plan

(08:50):
on being prepared if something comes tome. And I don't think that a
bolt action rifle, which by theway, was an advanced weapon of war
when we were still shooting muskets,all right, and so when somebody came
out with a center fire cartridge andthen they advanced from a single shot to
a bolt action to whatever, youknow, oh that was, you know,

(09:11):
that was probably a weapon of warback then and still can be because
a single shot rifle with a scopeon it is a very precise, long
range weapon. And don't you thinkfor a second that they won't go after
sniper rifles once they get those,And that's you know, we're never gonna
let them have them anyway, butthey're certainly gonna continue down that path and

(09:33):
keep trying. It's a bunch ofand they'll try any way possible to disrupt
our ability to use them. Ifthat's going after ammunition or what have you.
We're going to pick up right theretwenty one minutes after the hour personal
defense segment, before we get toa few stories in the news. I
want to keep talking about this,well, the story that Lee Williams is
writing about as an NBC News story, and you know, say no more.

(09:56):
These are the same people that editedGeorge Zimmerman's call to make it sound
like he was stalking some guy basedon race when he was answering questions from
the dispatcher. But they took allof that out change context of things.
They don't do their research. They'relazy, but that's sort of a malady
in today's media. Charlie, whyis our side though so bad at I
don't know, knowing what we shouldknow and being able to articulate it.

(10:22):
I think it's because we trust therule of law and we trust that things
are going to work out. Youknow, our side has faith. Our
side believes that right is right andwrong is wrong, and that you know,
good's gonna triumph over evil and allof the things that we believe in.
I mean, we you know,you don't have faith and not think
of that, but you know,so we we feel like people should fight

(10:46):
fair, they should use the truth. They should reason and use logic and
information correctly and apply all that tothe decisions that we make. And the
other side it's ruled by emotion.No, facts, don't care about the
acts. Will lie about the facts. Um, make up facts. Um,
we'll take facts that are true andtwist them around to their own,

(11:09):
you know, in their own favor. Well, it's like doing a calculation
until you get the number you want. Yeah, I mean, you just
keep how many times you got todivide by that to get to the number
you want to be And and thenlet's fudge a little bit and we'll round.
We'll round down instead of up orwhatever. Um. You know when
I say I see news reports andeven even like Fox News, now you

(11:31):
won't believe what this person said.And you have to read the article to
find out that was something innocuous oror so, and so you know,
uh, the LGBT rule uh eliminated. Well, it's before some legislative thing
goes into effect in two weeks andthis this and that and other, and

(11:52):
so you have to read the newsto dispel the headline. Even on the
right, you have to do that. The news news reporting is on you
know, you have to go outof the mainstream to get the real story
a lot of times, or digthrough when you have to read a news
article on a left or the rightand then google facts in there or look
up facts, and that is tough. Yeah, to be able to determine

(12:16):
what the truth really is and whatthey're really talking about and what really happened.
I shouldn't have to research the newsarticles to determine what's true or not.
And so that's why that reporter getsa check, is they're supposed to
have done the research, right,so they've paid a few bucks so they
could get a check or whatever.I just I'll watch what we say and

(12:37):
what they say. When I hearsomebody that I agree with say something,
nowadays, I also look it upand try to find out what I can
inform my own opinions, because forsome reason or another, people look to
folks like us and expect us toknow things or to be able to render
a valuable opinion, the reasoned opinion, and what do you think about this?

(13:01):
And if you just spout off becauseI just want to give an answer
and make myself feel important or Ifeel like I know something. I want
to look important in this person's eyeswithout giving it. A lot of times
I go, you know, letme, let me look at it,
let me read. And I findmyself all the time doing research for other
people that lean on. You know, we'll ask a question. I mean,

(13:24):
it's there's a lot of things Idon't know anything about. I know
about guns, and I know youknow about the Constitution, and I know
what is important to reasons, youknow, conservative people. But yeah,
our side we have a hard timebecause a lot of times we don't research
things. If you get into youjust can't use emotion. And so when

(13:48):
people ask me a question, Ialso give me just a second and I'll
pull up some stats and some factsand I try to keep a certain number
in my head when you start talkingabout gun deaths or things like that,
and you know that's well. Imean, something as fundamental as AAR does
not stand for assault rifle in thein the wrong hands, it certainly identifies

(14:13):
as one. But you know,that's the way things are today is people
people put labels on things that theyaren't and when you get in the habit
of changing the names and the meaningand the when when I mean, but
we seem to be good at itin every other work, you know,
experience that life is offering us.We're changing the definition of a woman exactly.

(14:33):
And the thing is is, Idon't care what people do with their
lives. I don't care which waythey go. I don't I don't care
who they I don't care. Okay, that's their life they lead. You
know. You can talk to discustommorality of it, and whether it's a
sin or not. You can discussthose things. But ultimately, what it
boils down to is when you canstart fundamentally changing the definition of things,
then who cares what something really means? At that point everything is so fluid,

(15:00):
right, you know. So tome, you know, that's aar
stands for another rifle, I mean, and that's what I want to probably
have about in the next week.Is another rifle. That's to me,
that's what it means. So mywife, why did you bring that in?
It's just another rifle. That's anotherr No, no, no,
no, no, no, howI see it. That's not say it

(15:22):
my truth is just just another rifle. And besides, it's identifying absolutely that's
something else. And the math isfuzzy because that's not thirty rounds. That's
that's that's you know, officer,I'm not hunting with a thirty round.
Maggot said, I'm hunting hogs.I'm not hunting the deer. The deer
out there not what I'm hunting.I'm hunting those hogs. And I can,

(15:43):
you know, do different things.There you goes and we are back
Charlie Strickland with me of the Talenttraining group. Are you looking at me?
How just you already said it?Yeah? I know. Um,
I want to talk about something elsehere. I want to get your thoughts
because I am totally conflicted. Andthis is a real life circumstance that any

(16:07):
number of us could face. Andit's the case of the marine David Daniel
Penny, New York City subway,a guy who I argue shouldn't have been
out it was mentally ill, buthe's now making threats threatening him. They
get into an altercation. He putshim in basically a rear naked choke and

(16:30):
the guy dies. Well, that'sa technique that's taught. And I love
how you are conflicted on something.Don't tell me what you're gonna ask me,
give me three other things to talkabout, and then come in here
and throw me a curvebox baby tocome up with a concise response. We
have ten minutes. Then I don't. There you go. So now that
is a technique that's taught. Iwas just studying. I looked at the

(16:52):
high Liability section and want of LawEnforcement manuals. Because I went back and
took the state board. I wasjust curiously if I could pass it and
the U and it's still in themanual that that technique is still in the
Highlight Ability Defensive Tactics Manual as mostagencies prohibited now, but the thing in
some some laws prohibited. But thefact is as the military has taught that,
so he was using a technique thathe knew to work. They use

(17:15):
it in in MMA, they useit in wrastling, I mean, and
it's allowed in MMA, as listenershave pointed out by email this morning,
because it's not a it's not ait's not considered deadly forced in most instances.
The thing is is you should holdit until the person is no longer
prevented providing resistance, and at thatpoint you should release because you're cutting off

(17:36):
the blood flow to the brain andum, you're not cutting off the wind
that you're cutting off the blood flowto the brain if it's executed, and
it only takes a few seconds ofthat before the person goes limp. I've
been on the receiving end of oneof those. Yeah, well the I
want to do it again. Soso, um, the fact, you
know, the concern there is ofcourse, you've got you know, prosecuting

(18:00):
attorney up there, that's a politicalmachine, and it's in a liberal town,
but it's a dangerous town. Andso you've got a trained military guy,
you know, basically chucking a guyout till he dies. And I
don't know enough of the detail.I don't know at what point, you
know, how long he was responsivethe storage and I read he had been

(18:21):
he was continuing to provide resistance forsome time. And so he maintained that
he's not a trained law enforcement officers, a military guy. Military guys aren't
trained to restrain people. They're trainedto kill people. You know, that's
what the military is for. Gothere, kill those people that are fighting
us, and then come back andyou know whatever. And so it's you

(18:44):
can't hold him to the same standardas a police officer. If a police
officer did that, and you're talkingabout a different situation because if they've been
trained in that technique and it's withintheir policy, it becomes more of a
civil liability issue versus a criminal thing. In his case, they can't sue
him necessarily. They will that somebodywill. He's been prosecuted. But he's
been prosecuted, So now I thinkyou'll have a good stout defense because everybody's

(19:07):
pouring money into his defense, asthey rightfully should. So I can't without
standing there, without knowing all theinformation and understanding a totality of circumstances.
It's hard to say whether or nothe went too far, went too long.
But the thing is, you can'thold him to the same standards as
if it was a New York policeofficer understood. My question though, is
have you seen because I have not, have you seen any reports indicating that

(19:30):
the kid that choked out and diedsadly had a weapon of any kind?
I didn't. He just was makinga bunch of verbal threats and he would
and buddy, I mean, look, he had seriously harmed people. You
have to ask and but you havebeen on the street, but you have
to view it from the totality ofcircumstances. You have to view it from
the position of the person who usedthe force. What did that What information

(19:52):
did he have at that point intime. You can't go back and say
he should have known he would haveknown. What did he know right then?
And you have to put yourself inhis position and what was reasonable?
So was the force that he usedreasonable under the circumstances for what he knew
at that point in time, Andthat's the key. Without knowing all of
that, it's hard to render decision. I support what he did. I

(20:14):
support him until the state can proveotherwise, I'll be behind him one hundred
percent. It's just one of thosethings where you know you're darned if you
do and you're darned if you don't. I mean, he did the right
thing trying to protect people, andthere were a lot of people there.
Listen, the human body can withstanda lot, but sometimes it's fragile.
In that case, that guy hadall kinds of stuff working against him.

(20:37):
So, I mean, I've seenpeople chased and jump back up and continue
to fight. I've seen people chasedand not make it. So final segment,
Personal defense. Charlie Strickling of theTalent Training Group just another moment on
this case in New York City.I'm conflicted on whether I think he can
get a fair trial. On onehand, you've got the DA that's a
joke, just a train wreck anda joke. But you also have a

(21:00):
populace that is sick and tired ofthe crime in that city. I think
they are. And juris selection isgoing to be key in that case,
you know, because and don't youthink he won't have a good defense attorney
in a good defense They're they're going, yeah, now he may end up

(21:22):
taking a police to a lesser chargeor something just to avoid the possibility of
going I'm with you. I mean, I am very conflicted because I think
he was acting in good faith.Agree, and I think he had all
the right intentions. But at thesame time, how long did he keep
him in that position? Did hequit resisting, did he maintain that position?

(21:45):
Did he go beyond what's reasonable?But then again, did he know
what was reasonable? So it's oneof those things where it's easy to jump
on the bandwagon on either side.I don't do that. I try to
reserve judgment and go there's a lotof factors that we don't have all the
intimation until proven guilty. Right now, you actually to me, he is

(22:07):
actually one innocent, He did theright thing. Um, the case is
gonna have to play itself out basedon what was reasonable, and I just
don't know because I wasn't there.And that's the hard part and rendering decision
sometimes is it's hard to know ifyou're just not there because you have to
put yourself in that person's shoes.You can't say, oh, standing over

(22:27):
here, I think that was unreasonable, or I think that was one hundred
percent right over here, but youweren't there, and without being there,
you know, in videotape lies asmuch as people do. I mean,
it represents one version of the factsfrom one view. And you know,
and then if somebody had to beenstanding there, let him go, Let
him go. I don't think he'sgoing to live. You know, if

(22:47):
somebody had had to been screaming atum, you don't know that that guy
even heard it. Because there's stune, a critical incident, stress, there's
things like um tunnel vision, auditoryexclusion, there's there's critical incident, and
there's all these things that happened tous. You know, when our heart
rate gets to a certain level whenour breathing rate gets to a certain level
when we were trying to perform undercritical incidence stress. There's so many things

(23:10):
that we just don't our body doesn'treact well to unless you've prepared it.
And that's the whole part of training. And so you know, you look
at a video when you don't havea sense of what that person, what's
going on in that person's head.In reality, I look at a story
like this and I just think tomyself, it just buttresses something that you

(23:32):
and I and JD have talked abouton and on for going on years now,
and that is just the importance ofsituational awareness and thinking ahead. I've
gotten to the since we opened theDothan Reins, I've gotten to teach more.
I've had the opportunity to get backinto a classroom more, mostly in
small, one on one environments,and it's reinvigorated some energy I've gotten as

(23:56):
it relates to talking to people aboutthese situations because I instead of doing classes
of twenty people, I'm up theredoing two or three and able to address
personal situations and really get drilled downon things. And and you know,
people come up there if just fora simple shooting lesson. That's not what
they're getting. They end up gettingthe whole conversation about. You know,
I go back to critical incidence stress, which is why I just mentioned that.

(24:18):
I go back to, you know, how to perform under stress?
How to what's what's going to happenin real life situations where things are you
know, and I get people playingthe mind games. You know, what
would you do? Tell me howyour house is laid out? You know
where? Where would you when youget up? What do you see?
Um, it's important to go overthat stuff. You know, standing a

(24:40):
gun counter, buying a gun,that's that's a step, that's a baby
step really, I mean the realwork comes with how do you apply that
to the real world. It's likeif you teach somebody how to drive in
your driveway, but before you're ateenager, until they hit the road and
you get out and drive around townwith them and then let them go do
it on their own. They haveno idea of what it's really about.
You just know, here's the break, here's the gas. That's the gun

(25:03):
counter experience, driving around town andtraffic. That'st real life. Yeah,
you know, I've got a kidlearning to drive right now, so that
analogy works just fine. Oh yeah, this is how you drop off your
brother at school. Parking lots area whole different story. Yeah, they
are good to see you, sir. Charlie's strickling with us. Don't forget

(25:25):
Talent Outdoors on the weekend Saturday morningshere and there, all over. You
can get it on the IRT Radioapp. Just look for Talent Outdoors on
the Morning Show with Preston Scott