A pair of Second Amendment posts

It looks like Mr Obama doesn't like the Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States very much.

Seems he is now trying to sneak through a reclaimation of the authority to destroy surplus M-1 Garands and carbines. These rifles have traditionally been shipped to the Civiliam Marksmanship program who has been given the authority to sell these sought after and highly collectable rifles to qualified members of the program after an extensive background check.

Apparently, in addition, the administration wants to order that all fired brass casings be melted down to prevent them from being recycled by CMP shooters who have done this for years. CMP shooters have been recycling surplus property for over a century.

This looks like yet another case of government and their good intentions going after the wrong people.

For one thing there really are not a whole lot of criminals out there, if any, that handload their own ammunition but there are quite a few legitimate sportsmen that do. For another thing the traditional weapons of the criminals element do not generally include obsolete oversized WW2 battle rifles. Criminals prefer easily concealable handguns.

Over the years I have watched politicians do exactly what they should not do. They penalize the honest guy and reenforce failure. This is not necessarily a characteristic of the Democratic party but they sure seem to do more than their fair share of reenforcing failure and punishing success.

I get tired of governmental officials chipping away at my rights because of the behavior of a few people. It strikes me that the thing to do is punish the guilty instead of making the innocent suffer.

Guess what I am doing to do this November?

While I still have not found anyone to vote for, I have certainly found someone to vote against.
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Speaking of the Second Amendment, there has been a bit of a circus going on about a decision made by the upper management of Starbucks.

They have refrained by posting 'No Guns Allowed' signs in front of their stores having opted to simply let state and local laws set the pace. In some states the signs are meaningless. In other states they make it so a lgeally licensed person carrying a firearm cannot legally enter the premisises.

Of course the legally armed and registered person is never the problem. The Starbucks people seemed to have recognized that and they simply said that they will permit what is already permitted by state law.
In a way it is like telling people that if your car is registered that you can park in their lot.

Of course, the indignant Sarah Brady bunch started threatening a boycott of Starbucks, which is their right but they were in for somewhat of a surprise. Apparently an awful lot of carry permit holders decided to go to Starbucks that day to make their statements and a quick look at the Facebook page there shows that the Brady Bunch are quite the whiney little minority.

When you think about it for a minute a permit to carry concealed means you can conceal the firearm. In many states concealed means concealed and the little whiners probably do not realize how many times they are in the presence of a firearm. As a general rule if such and such a percentage of the populace is armed than it is a pretty good guess that that is the percentage of the population in the store you are in that are carrying firearms.

Most of the people that bellyache about this are generally unaware of this simply because they don't think. They would probably freak out if they knew that the guy in front of them in the supermarket line was carrying. Ignorance is bliss.

Over the past few years a lot of states have changed the laws to make it so the state 'shall issue' a carry permit unless they can show cause as to why the person shouldn't be issued a permit. Generally a criminal record or mental health issues are the causes for refusal.

In spite of the violence the naysayers have predicted, I have seen no increase in violence. In fact the only thing that seems to have increased is the number of robberies and the like that have been foiled by armed citizens. I have no problems with an armed robber being taken down by a citizen.

Still, the Starbucks people really did nothing as far as taking sides in this issue goes. They simply stated that they were going to accept state and local laws as their policy. What they did is as simple as that.

Gun owners consider this to be a victory. It isn't. The anti-gunners seem to consider this as a loss. It isn't.Neither side has gained anything, neither side has lost anything. It is nothing more or less than a company refusing to get involved in a political issue. The Starbucks people are simply letting people do what the law permits people to do. In a sense that in itself is a refreshing thing.

In a sense all the Starbucks people have said is "Settle it somewhere else!"



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