I was sitting about 3 feet away from him when he was doing that. Every time he was handling the plastic pistol (that is a FAKE), the shutter was snapping wildly. He was not showing how the thing would be handled at the range at that time. For a demonstration of picking up a gun, he actually handed that thing to me (I took it; finger off trigger, dropped the FAKE magazine, retracted the FAKE slide, and checked the FAKE chamber- passed with flying colors).
Did I mention that the gun was FAKE? The class took part in the basement of the Florissant branch of the St. Louis County Public Library, where real firearms are not allowed.
And BTW, Dale Schmid is no weenie- he is the head of the Second Amendment Coalition in MO, and he played a huge part in getting our CCW bill passed. The only reason the Post-Dispatch was there was because he had sent a rather nasty letter to the St. Louis County Council, accusing them of being "pawns for the paid staff," and he coped the paper in on it.
So Geek and Chris, I can vouch for what was being taught in that class- the lib photog just grabbed the worst shot he could.