While it’s a reference to Grandpa Simpson from “The Simpsons”, the phrase “Old man yells at cloud” perfectly encapsulates the absurdity of what’s going on in the video above. What it doesn’t encapsulate, is the danger inherent in powerful, influential people spouting observable nonsense in a public forum. Every administration has its gaffes, fuckups, and outright lies, and all of them, from everyone, deserve the same treatment, but “AR-15 bullets travel 5x faster than any other” certainly caught our attention.
We know that 5.56 (which one has to assume is the cartridge being referenced here) is fast, ranging between the high 2,000’s and low 3,000 FPS out of a 16″+ longarm. And, if you intentionally compared it to one of the slowest common handgun rounds, out of a barrel less than 5″, you can probably arrive at a number like that.
What we don’t know, is how whoever wrote this for Biden to say happened to ignore every other modern pistol and rifle cartridge in the process. Functionally any decent medium-big game round will push the same sorts of speeds, and carry a lot more mass in the process. Hell, lower grain .50BMG can outrun some larger 5.56, and if you really wanna see a cartridge that can extract people’s lungs (a previous episode of Old Man Yells at Cloud), we should start there.
Whether this is a pointed attempt to further villainize the AR-15 platform for obvious political gain, or the ramblings of a dude who, whether you love or hate him, one has to admit is in the twilight years of his effective cognition, it should be roundly and immediately called out as BS by anyone in the media with a lick of sense or integrity. Because it’s either a lie or ignorance, and neither should be allowed a pass, no matter who is offering them.
