Number three in our 21 gun salute to 2007 is our first pistol, the Sig Sauer P226. Chambered for 9mm, given a 12 pound trigger pull, and configured for DAO fire, the P226 is one of three pistols authorized for use as a NYPD service weapon. As a gun produced as a "service weapon" yet also produced for the civilian market, the P226 apparently runs the risk of losing a literal "beauty contest" that apparently takes place within the non-service weapon marketplace. For instance, take Jan Libourel's qualification within his otherwise excellent review of the piece in The Arms Sight:
Let's face it, some handguns are loaded with glamour, allure, "sex appeal" or whatever you want to call it - the Luger is one such gun that comes to mind, the Colt Python another. The SIG-Sauer P-226 is not such a pistol; it's built strictly for business. If your primary interest in a handgun is as an object of aesthetic contemplation a lovely thing with lustrous polish and blueing and a figured exotic wood stock, I suggest you forget about the P-226 right now and turn to the next article. If, on the other hand, you might be interested in a superbly accurate, rugged, reliable service auto that may just be the best thing of its kind in the world today, then read on ...
Having forgotten the likely metaphorical origins of colloquial references to a pistol as a "piece", the admittedly not gun buying contributors to Bostodelphia had not considered the above discussed "vanity" criteria to the gun buying market. This factor will certainly be weighed as we continue with our salute; but before continuing our salute to the P226 as an NYPD service weapon, it should be mentioned in the interest of fairness that Sig Sauer does manufacture, among a number of configurations, a special edition of this sidearm crossbranded in collaboration with a company that has been noted this year for both its service and vanity, Blackwater USA. As we're not sure whether the Blackwater P226 is in fact standard issue among Blackwater operators, and being sure that Blackwater will come up again at some point during our salute, we'll now return to the P226's more humble, less mercenary, service.
While actual statistics on the number of P226s on the streets with the NYPD have not been discovered by Bostodelphia, we'll gamble that there is a good chance a plain clothes police officer was carrying a P226 when she was assaulted by Philadelphia CBS3 anchor Alycia Lane. While this incident has generally been discussed in terms of Lane's recent scandal-checked and bad judgment call colored career, it wouldn't be Bostodelphia's Saulte to the Firearms of 2007, if we didn't also mention that Lane's career also included as a stint and anchor for NYC's Cable 12, where she covered the 1999 "41 shots" police shooting of Amadou Diallo. While members of Bostodelphia have propagated elsewhere the conspiracy theory that this whole incident was staged as "payback" against Lane's coverage, we weren't really taking that flight of paranoia seriously.
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