When hip waders just aren't enough...

...to keep the muck away.

Rather than puke, I'll just vent a little about the recent fainting-couch theatrics in Oregon over some predictably sweeping and authoritarian climate change bill. This sort of horror-show bill, and these sorts of political gameplay shenanigans, are so depressingly common (and ironic) that they hardly even rate outrage any more. So, maybe my bile today is more a result of the gorge finally spilling over, than of anything unique about this particular episode. Whatever.

Stipulated: that the walkout by Republican state senators was pure gameplay, intended to deny a quorum and thus kill off a bill they did not have the power to defeat by conventional means. I'll leave the arguments for and against the legitimacy of such procedural stunts to those who give a shit about such things, but it is historically undeniable that organized walkouts such as this are not uncommon for either blue or red wings of the Boot On Your Neck Party.

So, are we ready to play the spin game?

Here's the [Oregon governor] Kate Brown version of events:

• Oregon Democrats offer a common-sense Save The Planet bill, sure to pass with Democrat supermajorities in both houses. The squee! 
• Oregon Republican senators throw a tizzy and leave the state, clearly being unwilling to Save The Planet, instead being more interested in actively impeding your own Brighter Future, and probably eating kittens. The droogs! 
• Kate the Great orders the Oregon State Police to go and fetch the criminal miscreants with all due Authority. The justice! 
• Republican senator Brian Boquist brazenly threatens OSP, the government of Oregon and thus all living things by extension, by indicating he will not submit to Kate's common-sense extradition order. The handlebar mustache! 
• Totally documentably (trust me!) violent antigovernment militia extremist inbred fascistic ammosexual teabagging gunhugger misogynist racists of white male privilege and self-evidently low intelligence (why won't you ever come to the table with us?), and their inexplicable race- and gender-traitor hangers-on, threaten to appear at the state house in protest. The orc army! 
• OSP quite sensibly closes the Capitol due to the obvious and documented militia threat. The white knight! 
• Friendly media outlets help us out by pointing out that some of these threatening groups supported...the Malheur Refuge protest (gasp). The moral authority! 
• Politically reliable Esquire magazine contributes a wonderful hitpiece for the cause, which properly and sensibly calls out the seditious rabble for its instantaneous, unprovoked resort to violence. The outrage!

And certainly, if you read "The Insanity in Oregon Is a Glimpse of Our Very Dark Future" and don't ask a lot of questions, you might well see Courageous Kate & Co. in a positive light, and the walkout and its backers as mustache-twirling villains. It was designed and written that way.  If you're already a card-carrying Woke Progressive--well hell, you could probably have written the story even better, eh, and even added an Orange Man Bad flourish for good measure. Your sky is clearly the same color as ol' Kate's.

What color that may actually be, though, is open to speculation. Clearly it ain't blue.

The thing that sticks out the most, here, is the brazen chutzpah of painting the protestors as aggressors. Apparently Courageous Kate & Co. don't believe that sending the Oregon State Police, on an extradition sortie to other states, constitutes aggression. Those guns they wear are just decorations, you see, and if those who have gone elsewhere in protest politely refuse to go quietly with the nice large men with the rippling muscles, "weapons of war", legal impunity, and Mustaches of Understanding, they'll just say, "Oh, I see. Tut tut, guess we've wasted our time then, very well, have a nice day," and leave peaceably.

Uh-huh. Pull the other one. Even the most dimly honest observer of history can see that on such a mission, law enforcement absolutely will continue to escalate until the victim either complies unconditionally, or needs a body bag. No matter how long it may take. If this does not constitute aggression, then the word has no fucking meaning at all. It's bad enough that people usually just ignore the always-present official threat of "comply or die" as though it somehow doesn't exist, just because most people exercise--under obvious duress--the first option. "We" don't like stating it how it really is--that even the collection of a parking ticket carries with it the ultimate threat of death--but that doesn't make it untrue. But then, for officialdom to step up on the moral soapbox and paint someone who actually removes himself from a brewing fight, as an aggressor...

...with or without a response that declares, "No. Your move."...

"Hypocrite". "Chutzpah." "Cognitive dissonance." "Hubris." "Tyrant." Mere words are insufficient to fully convey the complete absence of moral authority here. This isn't a public discussion, it's a show trial, a pile-on, and if you look at it that way, a whole lot of things make more sense.

(I seriously miss the late Will Grigg at moments like this. He'd find the perfect historical parallel in some forgotten story of fugitive slave recovery, weave it into an anthology-ready narrative--and be able to do it all without swearing. He'd also observe that, whether or not he'd agree with Brian Boquist's politics in any way, the latter's response to the threat of forcible kidnapping over a disagreement in politics is not so much a quintessentially American attitude, as it is nearly a human duty.)


That may be, for me, the worst smear--painting a "no" response to a clear threat of political violence, as aggression--but it's far from the only one in this sordid story. For those who cannot--or will not--see the difference between aggression and response, the smears come easy, and the Hive Mind's juvenile attempts to portray gun-rights activists of any sort--here, it's Threepers, Oath Keepers, and local private militia, plus their supporters--as imminently aggressive and violent, would be dismissable as "file photo" retread, if it didn't still work so depressingly well on the credulous. Look, I've got my own objections to some of the things I've seen these groups do, but one thing they are not, is preemptively violent, or even impolite, in the face of a pretty much never-ending onslaught of bigotry and dehumanization from the victim-disarmament (VD) crowd. And that latter's open contempt inadvertently reveals that they damn well do understand that gunnies are not fight-pickers; as Joel has put it before, if these people actually thought we [gunnies] were as dangerous as they say they think we are, well, they'd treat us a lot more politely. Given the spin-production machine the VD types have metastasized into over the last few decades, squatting on every opportunity they can imagine or invent, one can't help but get the impression they're quite deliberately poking the wolverine until they get a bite back.

There are other, more garden-variety contributions to the spin, too, but again, these have been so common for so long now, they hardly even register on the reader's radar anymore. There's the simple political hypocrisy:  it seems that ol' Indignant Kate apparently thought that partisans going AWOL for the purpose of denying a quorum was just fine some years back, when Team Blue was doing it for (I'm sure) some purpose of noble embiggenment. There's the partisan partial-truth-telling:  thinly veiled media hitpieces conveniently forget to mention that walkouts are and have been common;  why do that when cheap PR points can be scored against the opposition that they insist they don't have, because they're so unbiased and professional and all. And of course there's all the other usual shenanigans of business-as-usual partisan politics--on both "sides" of the aisle--usually delivered with great sanctimony along the lines of "if you don't drink all my Kool-Aid then you clearly want to spit-roast your own children".

There's an interesting article here, about that notion of weaponizing everything and radicalizing everyone in the process, and that goes along with a pretty well-done statement here which simply further generalizes the same idea.  (Sometimes, with so much stoopid in the world, it helps simply to recognize that not everyone is so credulous.)

At this writing, there are still two days left before Oregon's legislative session expires, and at this point the fugitive slaves will probably stay away for the duration.  Of course, nobody should be surprised if the home team manages some sort of ace-in-the-hole surprise when people do come back--these are politicians, after all.  That group of people whose approval ratings may, some day, with a sincere and dedicated effort, make it up to their hat size.

And yet, millions of people put these same oxygen thieves into, and back into, "legitimate" positions of power, every year.  Afterward, those same people wax betrayed and indignant at the ensuing shenanigans.  (And call me the crazy one, since I want nothing to do with any of it.  The world is baffling sometimes.)

Yes, David. Yes.

Saw this from the redoubtable David Codrea today:

I vote for good when I engage in a mutually voluntary and acceptable association or transaction. When I vote for a political candidate, I'm picking up any chair in a bar fight I did not start, with the sole intent of extricating me and mine for the time being with minimal injuries.

Not sure I've ever seen it stated more honestly than that.  Even as someone who happens to be committed to the other decision that can arise out of that observation (I simply reject the fait accompli argument for the permanence of the state), I'm in full agreement with the observation itself.  

Yet another example of why David is one of the most important "gun writers" we've ever had.  

What is it with people named Bob?

And so over at Mike's place there has been a bit of back-and-forth between MBV and this Bob Nicholson character, who originally penned this anti-NRA hitpiece.  Mike gave him one of his nearly-patented responses, and somewhat unusually, this time he got a reply back.  To which Mike volleyed, bringing us to today, with Nicholson attempting what might be called a "who, me?" tactic to dismiss and avoid.

Ol' Bob offers us all the smarmy confidences of the professional Astroturfer, with the added narcissism that comes from thinking you're the smartest guy in the room because you have a professional license.  He goes to lengths to make sure we know he's one of us--in just exactly the sort of loudly self-outing way that only the completely tone-deaf can manage--even as he repeatedly condescends to the simplistic projections of himself that he has somehow convinced himself that we are.

Sadly, you know the type.  They're coming out of the woodwork again.

Anyway, he must have been a little flustered as he concluded his most recent facile attempt to dismiss Mike, as his ability to spell started to crack a bit there at the end.  No matter.  He'd have to work a lot harder at bad mechanics to get me to look past the inherent chutzpah of his content here:

"I beleive that thothing I supported infringes on rights. You disagree. Fine we will leave it there."

Oh Bob, please do piss up a rope, willya?  We both know perfectly well that you won't "leave it there".  You toss that phrase out there like you expect others to believe you mean it, but you don't.  See, the one thing--the one, single, solitary, only thing that free people require, in the absence of having actually harmed someone, is to be left in peace, unmolested.  And that is the one thing that you absolutely will not do, no matter what sort of sophist drivel you may spout to the contrary.  You will continue to agitate for the forcible prior-restraint violation of untold masses of people who have not harmed anyone.  Violation that, whether you choose to admit it or not, will be carried out with all the fervor, sanctimony, abuse, and blowback of the functionally identical War On (Some) Drugs.  At the point of the government's guns.

The government's guns, Bob.  You know how you thought you were being so smart in trying to chide Mike for calling you a "collectivist"?  Well, it's hard to get more functionally collective than forcibly imposing your political will--in the form of total State control over the exchange of private property between individuals engaged in peaceful commerce--with government "gun cops" running naughty-and-nice list operations.

Yes, Bob, you're a collectivist.  (Sadly, most people are, so don't let it get you down too much--but you do need to own that.)

You also need--seriously--to let go of these delusions you have, that you understand either the people you claim yourself to be among, or the people whose stank you are pimping.  You don't.  You think you do, but you don't.  The former can see right through what David Codrea calls your "big but", and the latter, giving you benefit of the doubt by presuming you are earnest-and-merely-stupid rather than a willfully contributing Astroturfer for them, ...well, they are playing you and your desire to make nice like a cheap accordion.  Seriously, if you actually think that the NRA represents gunnies, or that resistance to gun control is somehow about the prurience of protecting a hobby, or that MBV is somehow agitating for conflict rather than trying to prevent it, or that anything that the disarmament crowd wants is in any way about protecting life, liberty, and property:  your ignorance is weapons-grade.

You may think you want to live in the world you ask for, Bob.  But you don't.  Maybe you think that you can violate people just a little bit, no harm done, and that's the end of the matter.  Especially if some of those people are vulgar and unwashed, or (even worse) uppity.  And it's something that you're okay with, so forcing it on others must be okay too--even if they've not harmed anyone.  (Yet.)

It's not like they'll ever come for you, after all.  You're a model citizen.  (No, seriously, you're exactly what the Establishment wants.)  You think all the right things.  You haven't harmed anyone (ahem), or even broken any laws.  You're safe.

Right?

At least say it out loud.

The indispensable David Codrea, here, vamps on yet another authoritarian nitwit's dutiful recitation of one of the classic facile sophistries of Ye Oulde Statist Playbook:  the Resistance Is Futile(TM) fiction.  To wit, according to the nitwit:

Assuming the military was part of the tyranny (which it would have to be for tyranny to have any meaning), any rebelling national band of “patriots” would be told something like, “you either lay down your arms or the entire city of Dallas, Texas will disappear. You have one hour. If you continue, the next city to disappear will be Atlanta, Georgia.”

As usual, David does a fine job at pointing out the obvious:  that anyone even dimly aware of human history can see that resistance is absolutely not futile;  that superior force of arms does not always translate into victory;  that tyranny's footsoldiers do not always run to stereotype;  etc.  There is no need to restate any of that.

What sticks out at me is that this "nuclear option" garbage, at least said out loud like this, seems to get trotted out in the early endgame, usually as a petulant reaction to the realization that the bloody peasants might actually mean it when they say no.  "Wait, you're just going to say no?  Well then, nukes!"

And that is but one setup to a classic exchange that we need to have so very much more of:

"I just can't believe you'd be willing to die over this."
"Well, not exactly willing.  But that's hardly the point.  The point is that you have made it abundantly clear that you are just fine with having me killed over this."

Well, at least they're saying it out loud, when they trot out "the nuclear option" like this.  The funny part is that I'm not even sure the state, itself, is stupid enough to nuke its own populace, for whatever reason.  Statists, however--QED above--may yet be even worse than the horror they support.

How cool is Marilyn Williams?

Pretty durn cool, from initial reports.  (H/T David Codrea)

The pair of alleged burglars then tried another house nearby, but little did they know that homeowner Marilyn Williams is a trained sharpshooter.

There's all kinds of irony in this story.  The one that jumps out to me at first is her (say it breathlessly, now) "sniper rifle":

Click you to embiggenate the awesome.

Hey, nice airgun!  That's a Benjamin Marauder, for which I myself lust in both rifle and "pistol" form.      It can certainly put its little pill into just the right spaces out to 75-100 yards, and I've no reason to doubt that this lady can perform up to her piece.  And her "M-Rod", presuming it begins with a suitable starting fill, has a 10-round magazine to work with.  Within its limitations, it would indeed be a viable choice for "sniping", for anyone who actually cares about the non-pejorative meaning of that word.

It would not have been pretty, though, if the thugs had come prepared for a fight.  Airguns are not "stoppers", and the powerful ones tend to be unwieldy--especially with the moon-scopes that airgunners love to put on the really accurate pieces.  As a "gunnie", I'd advise her toward all sorts of preferable alternatives in the firearm realm--revolvers, pistols, short leverguns and shotguns, etc.--but she may well already know about that.  I don't presume to know her story.

Fortunately, these seemed to be typical thugs, who wanted a score, not a fight, and Ms. Williams waged and won her fight purely with her attitude.  For that alone she earns my respect, to the point that I will make sure my girls are aware of what she did and how she did it.  (Is she a "freedom person"?  Who knows?  I don't need to know.  She doesn't have to be, to do what she did, which stands by itself.)

And I like the way she carries herself on camera.  David's comment was "Not Cooperating with the Narrative", which (as usual for him) is right on.

The ironies only get thicker from this point.

Take a moment to watch the video under that breathless headline "Female sharpshooter scares off crooks with sniper rifle".  (That is a separate H/T to David, as well.)

Now how does that title go with that content?  It is a wonderment, isn't it?  The title screams PSH, but the content is pretty golden, and even the talking heads (I know nothing else about "Fox & Friends") are pretty transparently into Ms. Williams.

After seeing that, I want to talk to her even more.  She just has to know the difference between an airgun and a firearm, and yet she parades that M-Rod all over the camera without saying a word about it.  She's never even asked about it, which is like division-by-zero in this tiresome age of "always-indict-the-hardware".  It's almost as though it's the way things should be, in a sane world--and I have this niggling feeling that she may be perfectly aware of the ironies, and may simply be enjoying them.

Oh sure, perhaps I am being overly generous.  Again, I don't know her full story.  But I can see what she did, and in my book at least, that's earned her a cut above impartiality.

Not a trivial cut above, either.  Remember, she won her fight with her attitude, which more than made up for her sub-optimal hardware.  (Really, if her comments during the video are accurate, she didn't really "need" that rifle at all.)  I'll take that over any number of "gunnies" out there, who may have vastly superior hardware, but not an inkling of attitude to go with it.

Pay attention, girls.  This is what empowerment looks like.

SPHINCTRE. Score one for David.

OMG, this has to be the funniest thing I have seen in a long time.  Shamelessly re-provided via David Codrea at WoG:

SPHINCTRE

The tears.  They cleanse.

Dude sez: Onlier Operatorers don' need no steenking Four Rules.

Quite a comment spectacle on one of David Codrea's Facebook posts, linking to one of his Examiner articles, which then became its own WoG entry.  The topic was originally of the "Look at the hypocrite Daniel Craig" genre, but commentary exploded into something else.

Among other things, David said:

"...and would like to see some corroboration from an official source."

At the very least.  Maybe it's just me, but this Facebook fella's whole argument seems reducible to "Onlier Ones gonna be Onlier, and they should be".  A sample, from the Facebook comment stream:

[W]with all due respect, at the SMU level, they don't care if you have your booger hooker on the bang switch, with your sidearm pointed at your leg. SOP at that level is to disregard Rule 3 entirely, whether they're in the shoothouse, on the range or hitting a target downrange. Furthermore, it's also SOP to keep your weapon on kill in all training and operational environments, in violation of Rule 4. Not to mention the fact that they don't care if you're flagging guys in training or on mission, because at that level, you're moving too fast NOT to flag your teammates, and they know for a fact that you're not gonna shoot your buddy. They also regularly have teammates sit next to "Tangos" during live fire runs through the kill House, especially considering the fact that IEHR inherently involves pointing your weapon directly at a hostage.

And finally, seeing as how they're expected to know the weapons condition that they're in at all times, drills like this one from my old unit at the 27 second mark, in direct violation of the first weapons safety rule, are extremely common at that level:

http://youtu.be/RnOI-zCwwis

Oh, there's a lot more.  Of basically the same.  (Maybe you can find something impressive in that video.  I can't.)  And the "due respect" level takes a few dives from the above.

I've little reason to doubt that all this above-the-rules tacticaler-operatorer stuff may well be SOP for what Grigg might call "the anointed", but "SOP" doesn't automatically imply excellence, either.

Cooper wrote frequently enough about people who would boast of both marksmanship prowess and of gunhandling technique elevating them above safety concerns of the Mundanes.  His usual response was "Show me.  I have the range, and the time."  Now, of course, we have YouTube.

I admit, I simply do not believe that anyone, at whatever level, can be functionally faster by NOT observing The Golden Rule, than he can while observing it.  Or maybe I could phrase it this way:  I cannot believe that anyone can reliably align a weapon faster than he can engage the trigger from a Rule Three position.  Hey, perhaps I'm wrong.  So:  show me.  Then show me where it made a difference.

(No no, don't tell me, let me guess.  That would be classified.)

Look, for me at least, it's mostly the "above Rule Three" mention that really gets my goat.  Observance of Rule Three can prevent disasters even when being in an actual fight with real people means you must stretch Rule Two (or Four) to its limits.  And you can do any of this while still faithfully observing Rule One. 

Ultimately, I'm technically unconvinced.  At best, I can see what people are getting at by saying that some "in extremis" tasks may arguably require a foot-fault on Rule Two or Rule Four--and that's it.  But here what we seem to have (tell me if I'm wrong, here, 'cos it seems clear enough to me) is a loud-and-proud blanket statement that The Almighty Onliest (however you may care to define that) are simply above safety considerations designed for peons--they are simply too good for that, and won't make mistakes.  (They'll "bet your life on it", they will.)  It would have been one thing to note that, say, hostage rescue might get difficult and painfully cost/benefit with Rules Two and Four, but to simply and without offering any evidence (other than "SOP, QED, N.A.T.C.H.") state that they're above it because they must be, rises beyond the merely unconvincing.  It also sounds very familar to the logic offered by certain others that this fella would probably not appreciate being compared to.

It's well enough known that Hollywood, Bond certainly included, is famous for "nobody who knew what he was doing would ever do that" cinema.  The details are so common they're frankly boring.  I suppose it is at least a little more interesting to have someone of the special-ninja class (I'll presume veracity in that, 'cos I'm sporting that way) drop in to a public place and dish on about all the things We The Unwashed don't know and he can't tell us more about anyway. 

But just a little.  There's already plenty enough to do to deal with Only One arguments from traditional gungrabbers.

Look, I'm no minarchist...

...and it's been some years since I "played one on TV".  As the old saw goes, at some point I ran out of excuses.

Still, I cannot deny that I'd nonetheless like things a whole lot more than they are now, with more people like Kit Lange running around.  Consider the open letter to the Washington state governor that she posted yesterday:

What is our crime?  The exercise of rights protected—not granted—by the WA State Constitution and that of the United States of America.  The exercise of rights you promised to uphold when you took office.  We dare to speak of liberty, we dare to stand against tyranny, and now we are being threatened with the same fate that Anthony has already undergone once.

We, the patriots of Washington, appeal to you now.  We want no fight.  We want no conflict.  We wish to be left alone in peace, to raise our families and live in liberty.  We ask that you stand with us and stop this violation of our rights, as is your duty.  Under no circumstances do we seek violence, nor will we start violence.  We are not, in any way, “anti-government” as the SPLC claims.  We simply demand that the government adhere to its Constitutional limits, protecting and maintaining the rights of the governed.

Please understand this: We will not comply with these continued infringements.  We will no longer be controlled and have our rights violated.  There is no more compromise.  If an inch of liberty is taken from us, we will take back a mile.  Because of this, we face persecution, arrest, and even death.

You can stop this from happening.  It is your job to stop this from happening, by upholding your oath to the Constitution.

The very word "patriot", any more, just makes my teeth grind, and of course I would argue that being "anti-government" should be the quintessential American mindset, not a derogatory epithet that we concede to authoritarians in our very speech.  And then there's the whole tilting-at-windmills thing with approaching Master to ask Master to restrain Master from abusing the plebes.

Still, there is a lot of good in this.  It speaks plainly, declaratively, and reads like the double-dog-dare that it should be.  And, to quote David, cum ulla sella in pugno taberna.  Indeed.

And Lange has been consistent and eloquent in this, from what I've seen of her thus far. 

Excellent.  May the ranks continue to swell.

Bummed for David.

I learned this morning, first from David himself on Facebook, and then again via...everyone else, that he has now had to follow through on his promise to leave the new Gottlieb-controlled JPFO, if it ever got to the point where he felt censored in writing content.

Gives me no joy to hear it, but it sounds like that's exactly what happened.  (Yes, I understand that the backbreaking straw was at KABA, not JPFO, but I cannot fault Codrea for recognizing the very clear writing on the wall.)

Well, there it is, then.  I can't say it's a surprise, but I suppose I did want to be proven at least a little wrong at least a little...or at least a little longer.  In the end, that didn't take long at all, and that just makes me bummed for David. 

I can say this:  Codrea has handled this whole unfortunate affair with a considerable amount of class, and has reaffirmed for me why he is one of the lasting giants of gun rights.  Long may he ride, shoot straight, and speak the truth.

I never knew him personally, but from what I understand, I do suspect Aaron would have backed him on this.

It's hard to express...

...how much I want to see Mike Vanderboegh return, healthy and free, and having made his point.

Sure, I've got my own points of disagreement with MBV, but I can't help but admire many of the things he does and the reasons he does them.  His "in your face" crusade of the last several years is simply inspiring, even when it seems to be pissing up a rope or involving (what seem to me) pointlessly risky actions.

I've said before that I'm torn on the idea of appealing to Leviathan's institutions, in the hope that Leviathan might restrain the excesses of Leviathan.  And a part of me sees this February 7th event as just that.  But it's not just that, either, and it's somewhere in the "not just that" that Mike works his unique form of magic.  He seems to have figured out how to push people's limits right up to the point of crossing over into actual stupidity, without ever going over the line on anything important. He also seems very effective at reaching invested minarchists on something crucially important, that I would think makes the point against minarchism in and of itself.  And my word, but he's good at this.  He's the firebrand that at once holds back the truly excessive and stupid, and yet scares the polypragmatoi in a way they cannot ignore or marginalize.  Both ways!*  And I cannot help but perceive that this is effectively galvanizing exactly the demographic that it needs to--bit by bit, day by day, headline by headline, mind by mind.  I'm not sure the value of this is really calculable. 

Which, of course, makes me anxious for his safe return.  (Equally-impressive-in-his-own-role David Codrea probably said it best.)  I don't think I doubt the intent of the Washington folks that Mike is going to assist;  from what (little) I have seen they seem to be more principled than reckless, and December's "I Will Not Comply" rally seemed to come across as at least a qualified success.

Still.  These are not nice people that are getting poked with a stick on Saturday, and even worse, they are people that are widely legitimized to have power over people's lives.  (That Leviathan problem again.)  So I truly don't know what I think will happen.

But I know what I want to happen.  I want Mike around for as long as possible.  It's not for me--what he did for me, he did long ago--but because I see his continuing effect on new people, and I think we need as much of that as we can get.



___________________________
*  And how bitter an irony is this?  In my book, with my definitions, this makes Mike the ne plus ultra of actual compromise, of actual pragmatism;  to the extent that there is any honor left available in either of these words, Mike has been living it.  (I'd like to think that he might forgive me by understanding how much of a compliment I actually mean that as.)

What David said.

I've not written here about the whole open-carry protest "movement" that seems to be going on these days.  Really, there's a simple reason for that:  it's inherently in the political realm, and I can't really "side" with any of the demonstrators without feeling like I'm somehow legitimizing the underlying politics*.  And I'm sure as hell not going to do that on purpose.

Besides, sometimes others say it better than I ever could.  Today, David Codrea addressed it this way, in re Target:

That first part is all that should matter to us. For a company that never wanted this distraction in their stores and were forced to walk a tightrope, what more do "we" demand from them?

This is no victory for the antis. If they tell people it is, they're liars, which should not come as a big news flash.

If someone doesn't want to fight and is leaving you alone, don't back him into a corner. If you do, expect him to react in his interests, not yours.

If you still don't like it, you don't have to shop there. Me, in the absence of belligerent aggression that invites further observations, I'm moving on.

Magnificent.  Simply magnificent.

I suppose one could gripe that "That first part" implicitly acknowledges the legitimacy of "local laws", but that's not the point David is making.  And anyway he's still spot-on that it is about as respectful a means of declaring "no dog in this fight" as I could imagine.





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*Sure, I'd like to see both open and concealed carry normalized and common everywhere, but I can't see winning the hearts and minds of individuals by adopting inherently collective strategy to do it.  I'm much more of the MamaLiberty frame of mind on the matter:  I'm going to do what I do every day, and that is going to be much more authentically "normal" than showing up with a group whose express purpose is to say, "LOOK AT US WE'RE NORMAL!"

Ahem.

You know, in high school I was blessed with an outstanding English teacher who impressed many things on me that really were useful.  Among the strongest was her insistence that there truly is one book that is always worth burning:  your thesaurus.  She said that if we used a thesaurus to help ourselves write a paper, she would be able to tell immediately, because a thesaurus word simply jumps off the page at her.  It is not a word we would use normally, in regular dialogue, but rather it sits there and screams, "I am a word!"  I have no doubt--no doubt at all--that she was being wholly honest about this.

I think a lot about her, when I see people gather together for the specific purpose of making a political point.