Group calls for candidates to 'shoot it out'

The Montana Shooting Sports Association is inviting candidates for Congress from Montana to a Congressional Shoot-off at its 22nd Annual Great Northern Celebrity Bowling Pin Shoot at the Deer Creek Shooting Center, near East Missoula, on Sunday, July 23.

This event is conducted to raise funds to support the right to keep and bear arms. MSSA is the primary organization asserting the rights and prerogatives of gun owners in Montana.

Participating candidates will compete in this traditional pin shoot with the firearm of their choice.

"The Montana candidates for the U.S. Senate and U.S. House are all Western folks," MSSA president Gary Marbut said. "We expect they can use firearms. We know they can talk. We want to see how they shoot — if they are straight shooters. We'd like to see if their support for the right to keep and bear arms is just academic, or if they can actually shoot. We are especially interested to observe the shooting abilities of Sen. Conrad Burns and challenger state Sen. Jon Tester."

MSSA will ask each congressional candidate to select three events in which they are willing to compete, and will choose one event in common for each political race for head-on-head competition. MSSA will provide guns and ammunition for any candidates lacking those essentials.

There are events for single-action revolvers, double-action revolvers, autoloading pistols, pump shotguns, autoloading shotguns, lever-action rifles, .22 pistols, .22 rifles, 9 mm semi-autos, semi-auto rifles and bolt-action rifles.

For the handgun, shotgun, LAR, 9 mm and .22 events, the shooter will face a 4-by-8-foot table 21 feet from the shooter. For all but 9 mm, the table will have five standard bowling pins, one foot apart.

The idea is to see how quickly the shooter can shoot all pins off the table. Each entrant will get three runs at the pin table — the best two count for score.

For the .22s and 9 mms (nine pins for 9 mm), the pins will be on the back edge of the table. For all others, the pins will be set one foot from the front edge of the table. The participant with the shortest time for the best two runs wins.

For the autoloading and bolt-action rifle events, participants must burst five pop cans at 30 yards from the offhand position. Participants will get only one run at these two rifle events.

The Missoula-based Montana Shooting Sports Association is a political action organization asserting the rights and prerogatives of gun owners, shooters and hunters in Montana.