A Moment Of Silence, Please
just wonderin, did union wages have anything to do with it??? hmmm, move the dang plant to TEXAS, we’ll put a bunch of mesicans makin them damned rifles at half the price. Move that damn’d plant to belgeeum and the damned french fries will take it over and stop production altogether for the sake of oil, ah, I mean world piece!!
Could we have a moment of silence please ...
... 
In Economic history, gun manufacturing led the way into the Industrial Revolution, with ideas like mass production & replaceable parts. Sad, but part of freedom—if idiots want to buy cheap imitations whatta ‘ya gonna do?
Posted by Oink
01/20/2006 at 05:04 PM
Bob: good thing. And you’ll teach him how to use it of course, God willing. I forget whose 10 y/o daughter is an enthusiastic hunter/huntress. Maybe she doesn’t carry firearms or is unusually mature. My dad would not let me shoot until I was 12/13. Then he was all over me like a cheap suit, safety safety safety!
I don’t hunt any more AND I avoid the woods during Indiana deer season. My neighbor won’t let his young kids play in the woods then either. Too many unsafe jerks.
Posted by Oink
01/20/2006 at 07:01 PM
Let us hope and pray that the plant may be sold and kept in operation. As a legacy and the embodiment of a great tradition, it should be regarded as a national monument. Too much of our heritage has already been sacrificed to some clown’s bottom line.
Tann: right again! But propping up a business that isn’t making it robs the people who work there of their dignity, and is indistinguishable from welfare. Keeping it as a museum might satisfy. Too bad consumers are morons.
Posted by Oink
01/20/2006 at 07:17 PM
I like the “eulogy” (ahem) from a staff writer of the Washington Post, that flagship of integrity, objective and unbiased reporting of proven facts, eternal pursuer of the truth with no agendas, whatsoever. (cough-cough-spit) The first impression you get is that of a real Winchester 1873 Lever Action Rifle admirer, hurting by the closing. But read between the lines. Here, a little sample:
(emphasis mine)All gone, all gone, all gone. The gun as family totem, the implied trust between generations, the implicit idea that marksmanship followed by hunting were a way of life to be pursued through the decades, the sense of tradition, respect, self-discipline and bright confidence that Winchester and the American kinship group would march forward to a happy tomorrow—gone if not with the wind, then with the tide of inner-city and nutcase killings that have led America’s once-proud and heavily bourgeois gun culture into the wilderness of marginalization.
They really want to believe that. (WAPO requires one time only free registration, little price for a good look behind the enemy lines)
Agreed, Oink, but I wonder if sales are really as slow as Herstal makes them out to be. I have learned to distrust foreign decisions about foreign-owned American businesses. What did you say? Cynicism should be a citizen’s obligation?
The only sure thing I see is this. If the plant does go, the value of all bona-fide Winchesters is going to go through the roof.
Good point, Mile66. It would be news to me, however (and probably news to WAPO) if more than a small fraction of those “inner-city and nutcase” killings are carried out with long guns.
And they would snob things up with that condescending “bourgeois,” and thereby give their real feelings away, damn them!
I should have known that such news would be cause for celebration in the sewers and cesspools of the left!
GRRRRRR!
This is the multinational future. I don’t like it. My pride as an American says that Winchester cannot be a foreign made product. It’s been a part of America ever since Oliver Winchester got the rights to the Volcanic repeating rifle. One of the most prized pieces in my collection is a Winchester High Wall Chambered in 40 Sharps Straight. It’s got a 4 digit serial number that I’ve tracked to the 2nd year of production. After roughly 130 years the bore is still sharp and the action is still tight. That’s American quality as I know it.
Speaking in practical terms, this is the future, we’d better get used to it and find a way to profit from it.
What I’d like to see is all those skilled craftsmen from Winchester have a go of it on their own. Shed the Union, shed the corporate ka ka and produce some really nice guns.
That’s what I’d like to see.
Olin? I had a pair of skiis made by them-mighty fine I might say too Comp-CRX circa ‘85.
But killing, what they know ‘bout killin.
I doubt if the boys (except for the whores) in mining camps were any safer from random violence than the Boys ‘N The Hood, or the hilljack Meth chemists. Otherwise, the article has the style of a New Yorker article.
Posted by Oink
01/20/2006 at 07:59 PM
FOC: The same folks make skis??? All companies must grow or die; producing quality stuff is a big part of success, but still just a part.
Life is change and competition is ruthless. Supposedly, none of the companies in the movie 2001 made it until the real 2001. But I don’t want a sob-sister liberal subsidizing the buggy whip and corset industries.
Posted by Oink
01/20/2006 at 08:07 PM
Amen, Brother BobF. BUT, a kid has to be old enough to hold a thought long term and to understand the real world & its consequences. Example: the young kids who were coached to recall bullsh*t with the day care/sex-abuse Witch Hunt.
I respected the fellow who brought his nifty new pistol to work to show-off. Altho I was probably the 15th person to see it that day, he showed me the emptly chamber before handling it. I trust you Partner, but I wanna cut the cards.
Posted by Oink
01/20/2006 at 08:39 PM
As for long guns and murders, luckily there was a liberal on a local forum trying to say that ak-47’s should be illegal to sell because 2 kids were murdered in the area with a stolen 1 recently around here… and I looked up statistics on long gun/ak-47 murders to counter his crazy argument..
will look up the info.. Heres the stats from the FBI for 2000-2004
Long guns are a very small percentage…
FOC is right. I would love to see a new company form. I should say something profound. I can’t. I think a part of me just died.
I think the new Dodge Magnums should come out with a dashboard holster system for Winchester rifles. Just like the pansy ass VW flower vase.
Hell, its got a Hemi! And a goddamn Winchester 94 lever action!!!
Who the hell doesn’t like shootin some bucks out tha window?
God damn good enough for the FOC!
Well I think I will stick with my Remingtons! It is sad that a company with so much history is being sold out. Personally I think the employees should buy out the rifle making division. If there’s one thing that truly represents America for foreigners it’s the Winchester lever action. A design classic. I still like the model 70 but I think Remington makes a more accurate rifle. At least you still have American gunmakers (Ruger, Remington, Cooper to name just three)
01/21/2006 at 06:31 AM
