Open Carry

OH YEAH!  This is where I want to be, out in public with a Second Amendment Righter like this

Folks, can we talk here? 

Something has been bothering me a lot.  It's these absurd "Open Carry" laws.  This is the law of thirty-one states that permit gun owners to openly carry their firearms.

Now I realize that my rant blog postings aren't my most popular postings (witness my last blog posting about "Pet Peeves.")  But this subject is one that I have to scream from the mountain top that is: 

STUPID!!!!

What is this all about?  Why carry a gun in the store?  

Oh I know all about the "Second Amendment Rights" but seriously folks, even those of you who subscribe to carrying your AR-15 to Walmart, would you feel comfortable at a public event with your children standing next to a doofus with his AR-15 automatic rifle slung across his round shoulders?  REALLY?

Demonstrating for their "rights"

It's been interesting to watch the Cleveland police chief defend the right of gun owners to carry their automatic rifles over their shoulders ("it's the law") while banning these items at the Republican Convention.

Yes folks, beer cans, tennis balls, and rope are banned near the Republican Convention site but GUNS ARE NOT. 

Yeah, and it shouldn't be

We all know that the NRA owns many of our lawmakers.  The NRA tells those legislators to turn around, bend over and grab their ankles and those spineless legislators cowardly comply. 

What's wrong with this picture folks?  

Just what we need, kids with automatic rifles

I don't know about you folks but in today's environment of mass shootings, why is this a law?
Are those legislators so cowardly and venal that they would endanger the whole public just so the NRA wouldn't go after them?  

When I was growing up I was taught that people in authority knew what they were doing.  That is a person was elected to a public office they were there to PROTECT us.  HA!  It seems that many them are only there to serve the interests of whoever owns them.  Be they the one percent of the one percent who contribute to their campaigns or the NRA who holds the threat over those legislators' heads that they will go after them.  

We are the only country in this world that has more guns than people.  We are the only country in the world that has these stupid gun laws that permit just about anyone to carry an automatic rifle in public.  And speaking of automatic rifles, why?  Their only purpose is to kill people.  They belong in the military, not with kids to brandish about in public.

Bubba and Doofus display their power

Even my state, Delaware, which I have often considered progressive and logical minded, has an open carry law.  

The last time I had a rifle in my hands was in 1962 when I did my annual rifle qualification while I was in the Army at Ft. Meade Maryland.  I've never felt the need to have a gun in my possession since.  I don't kill animals.  I depend on my local police force to protect me against criminals. That's what they're paid for.  

I would never in a million years have a gun in my house. Mainly because that gun would probably be used against me or be the cause of a fatal accident.  On that extremely rare occasion should you have a home invasion, a baseball bat is your best defense.  In fact you should always carry one in your car.  

When my father died in 2000, my Mother told me and my two brothers "You can now have Pop's guns."  My father was a hunter and had several rifles in a gun cabinet.  That gun cabinet sat empty until she finally gave the cabinet and guns to the son of my father's hunting buddy, who had died earlier.  

I know I'm pretty dumb in a lot of areas but this is one area that I am a genius.  Open carry laws are just wrong.  And I hope we don't have anymore senseless loss of life due to this asinine law passed by bought and paid for legislators. 

Where is the common sense?

Now this is a Mother

Gun Fails Competition

Here's something for all you Second Amendment folks.  Oh yeah, this is what we want.  No apologies to friends and relatives who are offended by this compilation of Idiots With Guns but this is what happens when just about every frigging person in this country has guns, the nuts have them too.  

Words fail me.

How Many More Must Die?

Elementary School Corner Ketch, Pennsylvania 1902

There was a day when a seven year old could go to school and not have to worry about being killed by a crazed gunman with an assault rifle.

The photo above is of my grandfather George Lincoln Hadfield's elementary school class.  The class photo of his one room schoolhouse in Corner Ketch, Pennsylvania was taken about 1902. My grandfather was born in 1896 and was about seven years old. He is the serious dark haired boy seated on the left.  

Most of the children in this photo were allowed to grow up and have families of their own.  If my grandfather had died during a school shooting I, of course, would not be here today.  

Thank God assault rifles were not available during his day to adults who were intent on exercising their Second Amendment rights.  Even though our American culture has always worshiped violence, at least children who went to school were safe.

1st Grade Class East Ward Elementary School 1950

As late as 1950, my brother Isaac also attended grade school where he and his classmates did not have to fear that a gunman would take their lives in a random shooting.  My brother is the third child (first boy) from the left in the back row in front of the school door.

Most of the children in this photo of the Downingtown East Ward Elementary School class of 1950 also grew up to have children and grandchildren of their own.  

Unfortunately, twenty children died today.  Their lives snuffed out by a culture that glorifies violence and has a twisted sense of "rights" that the average citizen has the "right" to own an assault rifle.  These children, whose lives ended today, will never grow up, never have their own families, never.  

Children leaving Connecticut grade school today after latest tragedy - 2012

A senseless tragedy.  How many more must die before we come to our senses in this country and put into place sensible gun control laws?