Sailor on the USS Fitzgerald saves over a dozen shipmates from flooding berthing  compartment, dies trying to save the rest.

When the Fitzgerald collided with the merchant ship, 37-year-old Fire Controlman 1st Class Gary Leo Rehm Jr., “leapt into action,” according to The Daily Beast.

The Fitzgerald was struck below the waterline, and Rehm Jr.’s family was told by the Navy that he went under and saved at least 20 sailors, according to WBNS-10TV in Columbus, Ohio.

But when he went back down to get the other six sailors, the ship began to take on too much water, and the hatch was closed, WBNS-10TV said.

“That was Gary to a T,” Rehm Jr.’s friend Christopher Garguilo, told NBC4i in Columbus, Ohio. “He never thought about himself.”

Humbling.

I want to open a restaurant specializing in corn tortillas with poppy seeds added for texture.

I’ll call them “Opiate of the Masas”.

Yes, I need coffee.

When you run a blog for a long time – and I’m pushing 16 years, here – you wind up with some regulars.  LIke most blogs, I have some commenters who’ve been here a very long time.  My blog authoring tool doesn’t record when people launched their accounts, but it does count the number of comments left.  I’ve got commenters who’ve left hundreds, thousands, and even some with over 10,000 comments.

And that’s great!

But we’ve had a couple of people pop up with their first comment today.

Welcome!  Hope  you stick around!

Two perspectives on the Yanez verdict:

David French at National Review points out something that a lot of Yanez’ defenders miss:

If you read carefully, you’ll note that it appears that the officer shot Castile for doing exactly what the officer told him to do. Yanez asked for Castile’s license. Castile told him that he had a gun, and the officer – rather than asking for his carry permit, or asking where the gun was, or asking to see Castile’s hands – just says, “Don’t reach for it then.” At that point, Castile is operating under two commands. Get his license, and don’t reach for his gun. As Castile reaches for his license (following the officer’s orders), and he assures him that he’s not reaching for the gun (also following the officer’s orders). The entire encounter, he assures Yanez that he’s following Yanez’s instructions. He died anyway.

I’ve heard more than a few police-supporting conservatives justify the shooting by saying Castile had been told not to reach for his gun – but to comply with the other order he had to reach in the same general area (right rear pocket).  Some, with the benefit of hindsight, think that Castile should have reacted better.

To which I respond “sit down in front of a microphone, or in front of a Toastmasters meeting, and give a speech for which you’re unprepared.  See if you remember your kids’ names”.  Stress does unpredictable things with human reactions.  Try it sometime.

Better yet, don’t. Carry permittees are taught that the most dangerous time they’ll most likely face is police contact.   If you’re a carry permittee, you need to train for police contact just like you train to deal with a threat; you need to go over your line, over and over.  Because from where I sit, it seems Castile’s big mistake was getting his lines backward – mentioning his gun before his permit.

The other perspective – NRA commentator Colion Noir:

Other than Yanez’s testimony, there is nothing I read about the trial or any newly revealed facts to suggest that Philando was going for his gun. However, I don’t know what Yanez saw that made him think Philando was going for the gun, I wasn’t there, and I only have his words to go by. Sadly, Philando isn’t here to tell us other than his last dying statement of, “I wasn’t reaching for it”.

Personally, I feel because Yanez pulled Philando over under
The suspicion that he was a robbery suspect coupled with the presence of a gun, it put Yanez in a heightened state. I feel he lost control of his wits and overreacted. This now brings me to the question of race. Do I think Yanez felt threatened by the fact that Philando was black? It’s very possible Yanez was indifferent about Philando’s race. However, because of the negative stereotype reinforced in the media about black men and guns, it wouldn’t completely surprise me if Yanez felt more threatened by Philando because he was black. This is the same negative stereotype that I’ve been trying to combat for years now.

Both pieces are worth reading all the way through.

Yesterday:  “John Ossoff, the Trump Slayer, in the most important Congressional race in history – a race that is a sure-fire referendum on Trump!.”

NPR’s wishful, romanticized coverage, before the news really sank in that the “Trump Slayer” was yet another empty Democrat suit.

Today:  “Just another special election.  Hard red distsrict!   Ossoff never had a chance! Nothing to see here.  Move along, citizen.”

Remember – John “Trump Slayer” Ossoff raised and spent nearly five times as much as Karan Handel, in a district that Trump barely carried six months ago.

And they were so hopeful.  From NPR’s extended tongue-bath of Ossoff:

“Ossoff’s campaign has long held that it has the edge in voter enthusiasm — a more committed base of voters who will flock to the polls regardless to support him. Handel’s supporters points to a core of backers who have followed her through thick-and-thin as well.

CNN’s panel of hairdos, watching the fat lady go for that high E flat.  Bias?  Perish the thought!

“Still, for Handel’s campaign, this could be a problem. She’s expected to trail Ossoff in the early voting numbers, and hopes for a solid election day turnout to notch a win. But the downpours could dampen voter participation in GOP bastions as well.”

Wasn’t even close.

I’m just gonna set this down riiiiight here.

Joe Doakes emailed me this request:

The case is over.  The next one hasn’t happened, yet.   This is the time to restart the conversation about the Pistol Protocol. Please run this letter on SITD.
Joe Doakes

So here is the letter:

Open letter to politicians, cops, citizens:

I write to enlist your support for law-abiding citizens.

The recent Falcon Heights shooting occurred two miles from my house.  I have a permit to carry a pistol, same as the driver. The cop was acquitted and social media is howling it’s a racial outrage but I’m not interested in who’s to blame in this specific incident.  I’m only interesting in making sure it doesn’t happen to me.

The evidence at trial boiled down to this:  the officer thought he gave a command which the driver failed to obey.  The eye-witness passenger thought the officer gave a different command which the driver was in the midst of obeying when the officer fired.  Neither the officer nor the eye-witness had time to think up a lie to pad the video to make themselves look better for a jury.  They both believed they were telling the truth as they heard it.  It’s a classic case of eye-witnesses recalling identical events differently.

I don’t want to die and the officer doesn’t want to kill me.  How can we work together to make certain that doesn’t happen?  Police have standard procedures for high-speed pursuit, for approaching a stopped vehicle, but apparently there is no standard procedure for Encountering A Lawfully Armed Citizen.  The advice I got in my permit-to-carry training was: “inform the officer you have a pistol and ask how he wants to handle it” which is another way of saying “There are no rules, the officer will make up something on the side of the road, but if you fail to comply, you die.”  That’s not good enough.  The driver might not hear clearly because of a crying kid or complaining passenger.  The office might not hear clearly because of traffic noise.  And instructions can be misinterpreted with deadly results.

The Falcon Heights incident is a vivid illustration of why the current make-shift policy is not good enough, why there must be a standard Pistol Protocol for officers and permitted carriers to know and understand, and why the high-stakes nature of an armed encounter demands the Pistol Protocol be stupid simple to understand and yet crystal clear to follow.

I think permit holders and law enforcement leaders should meet to negotiate a standard Pistol Protocol, add it to every law enforcement curriculum and role-play it in every permit-to-carry training session.   Here’s a draft:

Step 1.  Law Enforcement Officer (LEO) approaches stopped vehicle, Permit Holder (PH) rolls down window, puts hands on the steering wheel and keeps them there.  No other movement.

Step 2.  PH says “Officer, we need the Pistol Protocol. I have a permit to carry a pistol.”  PH says or does nothing else until PH receives verbal confirmation from LEO that the Pistol Protocol is in place.  If LEO fails to confirm, PH repeats the request for the Pistol Protocol.

Step 3.  LEO repeats back that PH wants to use the Pistol Protocol, thus verifying that the officer is aware of the existence of a legally permitted weapon and that a dialogue has begun about how to secure the weapon.  LEO says or does nothing else until he confirms that the Pistol Protocol is in place.  “I confirm you have a pistol and a permit to carry.  We are now using the Pistol Protocol.”

Step 4.  LEO instructs PH as to the next thing the LEO wants the PH to do so the LEO can secure the weapon.  Could be “move your car to a safer location” or “open the door using your left hand and step out” or whatever the situation requires, taking into account lighting, weather, number of passengers, etc.  Whatever LEO instructs, PH repeats back before doing it, LEO affirms or negates (followed by repeat of intended instruction).    “LEO:  Using your right hand, slowly turn the engine off, then put your hand back on the wheel.”  “PH: I’m going to use my right hand to turn the engine off, then put my hand back on the wheel.”  “LEO: that’s correct, go ahead.”  At that point, the driver turns the engine off and puts his hand back on the wheel. 

Step 5.  PH, moving slowly as LEO watches, carries out all LEO instructions until LEO announces the pistol is secure.

Step 6.  When LEO announces the pistol is secure, the Pistol Protocol is not ended, it is in recess.  LEO instructs PH what else to do (driver’s license, proof of insurance) and writes summons or gives a warning to complete their other business.

Step 7.  When LEO is finished with other business, LEO tells PH that LEO is restarting the Pistol Protocol to safely transfer the pistol back to the PH but LEO does not transfer the pistol until PH confirms that LEO has restarted the Pistol Protocol.  “LEO:  I’m restarting the Pistol Protocol to hand the weapon back to you.”  “PH: We’re back using the Pistol Protocol now.” 

Step 8.  LEO tells PH what LEO intends to do with the pistol, PH repeats it back, then LEO and PH slowly and carefully transfer the pistol back to the PH.  “LEO: I’m going to hand you the magazine to put in your pocket, then the weapon to put in your holster.  Do NOT load the weapon until you have left the scene.”  “PH: You’re going to hand me the magazine to put in my pocket and the pistol to put in my holster, but I won’t load the weapon until after I leave here.”  “LEO, okay, here’s the magazine . . . pocket, good . . . and here’s the pistol.”

Step 9.  LEO and PH go their separate ways.
There could be fewer steps, more steps, enhancements and improvements, but the key elements are (1) both LEO and PH affirmatively and verbally acknowledging the existence of the pistol so they can deal with it safely and (2) both LEO and PH read-back instructions to avoid misunderstanding, before any movement takes place.
This draft is not perfect but it’s good enough to be going forward.  Next step, figuring out how to get pistol carriers and cops on board.  Volunteers are needed to negotiate in good faith.  And salesmanship to convince cops and permit holders that it’s something they need to learn.
Could use a catchy phrase to help people remember.  The fire prevention people hit a home run with “Stop, Drop and Roll.”  How about:

Say It.  Repeat It.  Do It.  

Tell me.  Hear me.  See me.

Listen.  Repeat.  Comply. 

I work for the local government bureaucracy.  My bosses are sensitive to political pressure and controversy.  I can’t speak out in my own name so I’m writing this under an assumed name to ask for help. 

If you see merit in the idea, please take the ball and run with it.  If it’s not your cup of tea, can you forward it to someone who might help?

The tragedy in Falcon Heights ruined several lives.  There is absolutely no reason to ruin more.  Help me prevent that.

Joe Doakes, Saint Paul, Minnesota

It’s impossible to watch this seven minute video about the descent of Evergreen State University into Orwellian lunacy and not ponder the idea of rebooting this entire country, preferably by “letting” the coasts become their own little insane asylums.

As for me? The world of business needs to institute a system of background checks to weed any child who’s ever been involved in one of these groups out of the hiring process, or public life, for the rest of their lives.

Side note: for a liberal, Bret Weinstein has cast-iron balls.

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

I’m considered a “Boomer” because my birth date is before the arbitrary cut-off in 1964; but by the time I reached each new stage in life, the older Boomers already had been there and ravaged it, like locusts.  I was about 5 years too late for everything, which makes me feel less like a Boomer and more like one of the next generation.

Like this kid feels.

What’s it do to a nation when you believe your generation has no future, that the people before you squandered it?

Joe Doakes

I’m probably in the same boat as Joe.  The arbitrary date cutoff is wrong, of course; “Baby Boomers” are the children of people who came home from the war and started having kids.  As my parents were 9 and 5 on VJ day, that just wasn’t the case.  And if I were a Baby Boomer, perhaps I’d remember more about the Beatles than hearing they’d broken up on the radio.

Anyway – what does it do for a nation, believing that the previous generation squandered your future?  Good question.  I’m looking at Millennials – say, at Evergreen State – and wondering if they’re going to squander my legacy.

Florida Democrat Party leader urges fellow cultists to “hunt Republicans“.

Whenever you think the bureaucracy in the city of Minneapolis, or Minnesota state government in general,  is addled and hidebound, just take a look at India, and see what the future holds.

It’s bad enough when it comes to importing things or retaining Indian labor.

When it comes to “Justice”, forget about it.

Six British ex-military men employed by an American company on anti-piracy duties were arrested by the Indian Coast Guard 3½ years ago – and charged with weapons possession (for the firearms they used to, y’know, guard ships from pirates).  They’ve been rotting in an Indian prison ever since.

An international move is going on to try to get some justice for these guys.

…when conservatives encounter Liberals in the wild, perhaps we should raise our hands and chant “Hands Up!  Don’t Shoot!”

I try to be civil. I truly do.

But John Fugelsang is the one person on this entire planet that saves Samantha Bee from the title of “Most Vapid Pundit On Planet Earth”.

Seriously – Fugelsang, whose qualifications as a public intellectual seem to begin and end at “hairdo”, has already earned himself a Berg’s Law, and just keeps getting worse.

To which one responds “Only in America can you be pro-gun-control, pro-“campaign finance reform”, turn a blind eye to intellectual censorship and oppression on campus (and, increasingly, elsewhere), pretend “Antifa” is no big deal, oppose school vouchers and homeschooling, propose or support “Climate Nuremberg Tribunals” for scientific skeptics, and still call your self “pro-choice” with one cerebral lobe tied behind one’s back to make it fair.

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

I guess my political views are pretty hard-core right-wing. Even so, I can see a way for the taxpayers to fund Planned Parenthood.

If they offered sex education and free condoms or IUDs, so people who weren’t ready for kids wouldn’t get pregnant and contribute to the overall welfare caseload, I could support that.

If they offered abortions for women who suffered rape or incest; and the abortions were conditional upon the victim fully cooperating with law enforcement including saving fetal tissue for DNA testing; I could support that.

If Planned Parenthood offered the services it says it offers, and nothing more, then I’d be willing to fund them. The problem is that’s not all they do. The undercover videos of Planned Parenthood doctors negotiating for body parts shows they’re not in the baby-prevention business as much as the baby-killing business just like Kenneth Gosnell (but with better PR).

Killing the baby as it’s being born might technically qualify as “birth control,” but only in the most contorted use of the word. We could reduce class sizes in schools, if we murdered half the students. We need to look beyond the ends, we need to question the means, to see if they’re compatible with our notions of civilized society. To the extent Planned Parenthood persists in performing savage rituals and lying to me about it, I have no problem de-funding them. If Democrats want to shut down the entire government over that issue, I’d do it.

Saving babies is a political hill I’m willing to die on. The shameful part is there are so few of us.

Joe Doakes

I’m getting more militant about it the older I get.

The video I talked about.

Caution:  It is not for the faint of heart.

Watch this, and videos like this, enough, and you’ll get jumpy when “gun” is mentioned, too.

Today, the Northern Alliance Radio Network – America’s first grass-roots talk radio show – is on the air!

Today on the show:

• The Yanez Verdict
• The Second Civil War.

Don’t forget – King Banaian is on from 9-11AM on AM1440, and Brad Carlson is  on “The Closer” edition of the NARN Sundays from 2-3PM.

So tune in the Northern Alliance! You have so many options:

• AM1280 in the Metro
• Streaming at AM1280’s Website
• Streaming on IHeartRadio
• On Twitter (the Volume 2 show will use hashtag #narn2)
• Via my UStream video and chat channel.
• Send us an SMS text message – 651-243-0390
• Good ol’ telephone – 651-289-4488
• Podcasts are now available; for my show and for Brad’s
• And make sure you fan us on our new Facebook page!

Join us!

The NYTimes lied about Republicans, guns, Sarah Palin, and pretty much everyone in their editorial about the Hodgekinson attack – down to making up facts from thin air 

Davie French unravels the Times’ depraved attack on truth:

Let’s be blunt. In its zeal to create moral equivalencies and maintain a particular narrative about the past, the Times flat-out lied. There is simply no “link to political incitement” in Loughner’s murderous acts. The man was a paranoid schizophrenic who first got angry at Gabby Giffords years before Palin published her map.

This is, of course, part of an ongoing pattern of slandering everyone to the right of Martin O’Malley:

Let’s not forget, this is the same editorial board that, one year ago, laid blame on Republican Christian politicians for an Orlando terrorist attack by a confessed Islamic jihadist. Omar Mateen swore allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, but the Times editors believed (again, without any evidence) that he was inspired in part by Republican objections to granting men access to women’s restrooms. The editorial board should retract its editorial and apologize.

And would someone – Pat Kessler?  Bob Collins?  Erik Black?  Cat Richert? Nina Totenberg? – finally let slip the dogs of our mainstream media’s vaunted “fact-check” industry?  We’ve got a chain of howlers here:

In addition to lying about Palin, the Times couldn’t resist yet another nonsensical attack on gun rights — claiming that “studies” have shown that armed citizens would “probably” kill or wound innocent bystanders in the effort to stop the killer. Which studies? In fact, we have considerable real-world experience showing that armed citizens can stop mass shootings without harming innocent civilians.

We do, indeed.

As Dennis Prager says, the Second Civil War has been underway for some time, now.  Until Wednesday, it largely wasn’t a shooting war.

French also notes how Sarah Palin likely has a decent defamation case against the Times, even though she’s a public figure.  I hope she does.  I’ll contribute.

Remember when Tim Kaine – Hillary Clinton’s Veep nominee – told liberals to get out in the streets and fight Republicans (which his son took seriously)?

Either does the media…

A friend of the blog writes:

Thought you’d enjoy this, from the people who say, “it’s not about entitlement for bicyclists, and we don’t hate cars” oh really? Yet you say Summit Ave should look like this, congested for one bike rider?

This is what Summit should look like. https://t.co/9cvA7u9k1y

— Father Sonn (@mikesonn) June 15, 2017

Which links to…:

This is what Summit should look like. https://t.co/9cvA7u9k1y

— Father Sonn (@mikesonn) June 15, 2017

First things first: I love biking. I love biking on Summit. And there are days when Summit, especially down by Lexington, does look exactly like that.

But the correspondent is right.  When you watch “Urban Planners” (the people who make cyclocentrism possible) when they think nobody’s watching, the level of Urban Minnesotan Passive-Aggression is nauseating.  The primary goal is as much about sticking it to drivers as it is about “bike-friendliness”; de-timing stoplights, putting obstacles and chicanes in roads to “calm” (read: snarl) traffic, and giving away traffic lanes to bikes, transit and trains.

Or whatever.  As long as the Car People end up getting pissed on.

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

Republicans in Congress told me they couldn’t accomplish anything because they didn’t control the House.   So we got them the House.

They told me they couldn’t accomplish anything because they didn’t control the Senate.  We got them the Senate.

They told me they couldn’t accomplish anything because they didn’t control the White House.  We got them the White House.

Now they can’t accomplish anything because they don’t like the guy in the White House.  They won’t work with him.  And he hasn’t given them proposed legislation to consider.  He’s not their leader and even if he were, they wouldn’t follow him.  He’s a poop.

Pretty much, Republicans in Congress can’t accomplish anything.  So what good are they?

I’m thinking primary challenges.

Joe Doakes

Winning our own party is going to be as hard as winning the country.

I detest litmus tests.

I always have.  They’ve always struck me as a way to avoid needing to think too hard about things, especially politics; as a way to avoid having to deal with the nuances that are inevitable with a realistic appreciation of the world around you.

But over the last year years, Second Amendment voting has become, if not a litmus test, at least a key indicator about a politician’s, or group’s, or person’s attitude about the most important political question of all.

We’ll come back to that.

There are a lot of reasons I support the right to keep and bear arms, and am an activist on the issue.  But there’s only one reason that it’s a litmus test to me.

Line Of Defense:  Self-defense?  Well, it’s important.  The idea that people should be forced to rely on the attention span of the state for their safety is fantasy at best, a toxic delusion at worst.

The police are under no obligation to protect you, and even when they knock themselves out to try, it’s a fact – when seconds count, the cops are minutes away.

Them? Or you? You get to decide this.

But self-defense isn’t why this is a litmus test issue to me.

Value:  And even if they were obligated to protect you at all costs in all situations?

As Jeffrey Snyder asked 25  years ago in A Nation of Cowards – do you really think that your life is of immeasurable worth, but that of the cop we call when things get ugly is worth $50K (or whatever we pay a cop these days)?  No – if your life is truly of immeasurable worth, then it’s truly your job to protect it – right?

If you truly believe that your life is of infinite value, while that of someone who risks their life for your is worth merely a salary and a life insurance settlement, I have to question your moral order.   Not here, of course.

The real question is, is it morally right to demand, and expect, that someone risk their life to save yiours, even with aunion contract?

Deterrence:  There is no rational doubt that armed citizens deter crime.

The number of crimes deterred in a year is hard to estimate, since most – including mine – are never reported.   The FBI used to say 80,000/year; Kleck estimated two million a year in the early ’90s, 98% of them without a shot being fired.

Whichever is right, each of those is a victory of good over…evil?  Decay?  Collapse?  Of right versus wrong.   Each of those victories, morally, is of incalculable good.

But that’s not the reason either.

A Good Guy With A Gun:  You know how you know that “a good guy with a gun” is an inherently good thing?

Jeanne Assam was a good gal with a gun when she saved countless lives at the New Life Christian Center in Colorado Springs on 12/9/07. She shot and wounded Matt Murray – who, reverie broken, backed off and shot himself.

Because Big Gun Control spends so much time and effort trying to attack the idea.  Not with facts – or at least, not by presenting facts in a way that can  be debated (and, inevitably, debunked).  “Shut up”, they explain.

There is a reason that mass shootings happen in places (schools, government buildings, posted property) or cities (New York, Chicago, San Francisco) or states (California) and not at NRA conventions or in Bozeman, Montana. Good citizens with the capacity to resist are a deterrent.

And as we’ve seen in a few mass shootings, when a good guy (or gal) with a gun interrupts the narcissistic fantasy, the fantasy implodes; the bad guy with the gun usually gives up, or kills himself.   Exactly as law enforcement says – move in on the shooter to break their reverie -although they don’t generally circulate that for public consumption.

Nick Meli was a regular schnook with a Glock on 12/11/2011 when Jacob Robert walked into the Clackamas Mall in Portland, OR with a rifle and a couple hundred rounds. He killed two – and then saw Meli pointing his permitted Glock at him. He retreated into a store, and shot himself moments later. Two died. Only God knows how many didn’t.

But no – that’s not the reason that the Second Amendment is my litmus test.

Fun Fun Fun (Til The Democrats Take The Garand Away):  Let’s be frank, here – shooting is fun.   No – it’s fun!

The focus and concentration are a poor man’s Zen meditation.  A day of busting caps out on the range is about as much fun as one can have, by oneself, legally.

And for someone who always wanted to be one of those guys that could hot-rod a car, but never had the money or the mechanical aptitude?  Modern guns, being the modular creations they are, lend themselves to extensive hot-rodding; a plain-Jane AR15, or even AK or SKS, is within reach of a whole lot of people, an outlet for mechanical creativity that’s do-able even for people of fairly unimpressive mechanical skills.  Even Glocks have gotten “democratized”; it’s possible to buy aftermarket lower frames that allow one to soup up a humble Glock 19.

A vital policy point?  No, but certainly a factor, if only personally .

So while I’ll throw it on the “yea” side of the scale,  it’s hardly the reason the 2nd Amendment is a litmus test.

Being Necessary For The Security Of A Free State:  Of course, none of the above were the proximate reason for the 2nd Amendment – which was to allow The People to defend their lives, families, property and communities against encroaching tyranny.

The protection of property and the preservation of order; Koreans on the second day of the LA riots, after the police pulled out.

“What?  You’re going to try to fight a tank with a gun?   If government becomes tyrannical, you’ll have no chance!” the usual response goes – which strikes me as a bad attitude for a citizen of a free society to have even while they’re still “free”.  But we’ll come back to that.

There are two answers to that old chestnut:

1. Nobody fights tanks with rifles.  You fight the truck that hauls the food, fuel and ammo to the tank.
2. But think about it: what do we know about the average American serviceperfson?  That they are the children of people with two masters degrees in Political Science from Carlton, who shop at Whole Foods and listen to NPR and have “Coesist” bumper stickers on their cars and voted for Hillary?  No!  They are overwhelmingly the children of the blue-collar and middle-to-lower-middle class people that own the guns today.  If government, for whatever reason, decided to go door to door seizing guns, they’d be beating down the doors of the parents, brothers and sisters of people in the service.   How do you suppose that’d work?

The right to keep and bear arms helps ensure that an attack on freedom will be an attack on the standing army.   Which may be one of the best guarantors against the depredations of the “standing army” that our founding fathers so feared.

But important as that is, that’s not the reason, either.

Words Have Meanings:  No, the reason is this:   without the right to defend one’s home, family, property, community and freedom from both crime and tyranny, then “citizenship” is meaningless.

The word “citizen”, going back to its Latin roots, means someone who has the ability to govern oneself; one who is him/herself a microcosm of government – someone who has the means at hand to govern themselves, and to participate in and consent in their own government.

The Constitution and the Bill of Rights spell out the things that a citizen of a free society is endowed with by their creator; the right to participate and consent in their government via speaking, publishing, assembling, petitioning and voting; the right to not having their status as a citizen spuriously removed without due process, via jury trials, right to representation, freedom from unreasonable searches;  the right to be fairly secure that their property won’t be arbitrarily seized…

…the  right, means and power to defend one’s life, family, property, community and freedom.  Just like the government in which one participates.

Words Have Opposites, Too:  So being a “citizen” means having the ability to see to one’s own self-government – by oneself, as part of a small community, or a larger body that governns by consernt of the self-governing citizens.  

And if you take away any of the means by which a “citizen” governs, what happens?

Are they  a slightly lesser citizen?  No – it’s like taking away a hydrogen atom and wondering why you don’t still have water.

When a citizen can’t govern him/her self, then they’re no longer a citizen.  They are a subject of whomever took those rights away.

Observing the Second Amendment is one of the key differences between being a citizen – a consenting party to one’s own governance – and a subject, one whose life, liberty and property exist by the good graces of their ruler (or ceases to by the ruler’s bad graces, often enough).

And knowing that is why I will no more vote for someone who stands for abridging the Second Amendment than I will for someone who believes in speech rationing, or no-knock warrantless searches of people without meaningful due process, for that matter.

All three are non-negotiable.  All three are essential.  All three are reasons to go to the barricades.  I will no more vote for someone who promises to abridge my role as a citizen – by turning me into a subject  – than I’ll vote for someone who vows to send Jews to camps in Idaho.

Details:  “What – you think citizens should own cannon?  Tanks?  Nuclear weapons?”

They’re kind of expensive, and I dont’ wanna think about what it’d cost to practice with any of ’em.  But since we’re arguing out in loopdieland, I’ll bite.  Sure – show me why I shouldn’t, in logical terms – meaning terms other than “It doesn’t seem right to me”.

Put another way:  I’m a law-abiding citizen.  I’ve never stolen so much as a candy bar in my life.,  If you put a gun in my hand, I’m still the same guy.  I’m not overwhelmed by the urge to harm others.  How is that different if you put a machine gun, cannon, flamethrower, tank, or submarine in my figurative hand?  It’s not.

It’s also a pointless deflection.  Very few people are pushing to buy tanks – and I don’t think the criminal market for them is especially big either.

Many people are pushing, constantly and with great ardor, to abridge my right to defend my life, family, property, community and freedom, though.

A friend of mine wrote this on social media earlier this week, in re the City of Minneapolis’ proposed plasstic bag ban.

I know this is asking a lot, but I would like environmental activists to think more than one step in front of their faces. Case in point: The City of Minneapolis wants to ban the use of plastic bags in grocery stores (fortunately, the state legislature ended that, but please keep reading). Consumers would have to pay to take their groceries home in a plastic bag. At the same time, a Minneapolis sanitation ordinance says pet waste must be double bagged — in plastic!

So, we’ve taken in 2 cats who needed a loving home. And when we scoop their poop, we’re supposed to put it in a plastic bag that goes into another plastic bag before it goes into the garbage for collection by the city. But instead of re-using the plastic bags we get for free (just by virtue of buying groceries), we’re supposed to pay for the manufacture of “designated” plastic bags for pet waste? The sheer number of people who walk their dogs in the neighborhoods and city parks who are “required by city Ordinance” to pick up and dispose of their pet waste in plastic bags” is staggering.

Are you freaking kidding me??? Are you pet/environmentally friendly or not? And if you think pets are good for low-income and elderly residents who benefit from the companionship, you are penalizing them for the benefit you champion. Look past your nose!!!

We’re lucky enough that the City Limit is less than 5 minutes by car from our house. We can drive outside of Minneapolis to a suburb to shop where we are not penalized for using plastic bags.

The people further inside the city, without vehicles, are the ones being harmed by this environmental activist masturbation.

What’s that old definition of totalitarian?  Everything that isn’t mandatory is banned?

PS: She also notes that while walking around one of Minneapolis’ lakes, they noticed a lot of garbage lying about.   I know – Minneapolis has Socialist trash collection, how can that be, right?   And so they took time out from their walking to bring gloves and (presumably) plastic, legal bags for picking it up.

Might need a lawyer to do that in Minneapolis, these days.

1`Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

Republicans in Congress told me they couldn’t accomplish anything because they didn’t control the House.   So we got them the House.

They told me they couldn’t accomplish anything because they didn’t control the Senate.  We got them the Senate.

They told me they couldn’t accomplish anything because they didn’t control the White House.  We got them the White House.

Now they can’t accomplish anything because they don’t like the guy in the White House.  They won’t work with him.  And he hasn’t given them proposed legislation to consider.  He’s not their leader and even if he were, they wouldn’t follow him.  He’s a poop.

Pretty much, Republicans in Congress can’t accomplish anything.  So what good are they?

I’m thinking primary challenges.

Joe Doakes

Bigly.

At all levels.

Big Left has been warning us that there’s a wave of ideological hate crime just around the corner, and that  you gotta watch out for those crazy right-wingers.

It’s a Berg’s Seventh Law occurrence, of course.

A gunman attacked a Republican congressional baseball practice this morning.  His mission?  “Kill as many Republicans as possible”.

Shortly after the shooting Wednesday morning at a congressional baseball practice, Rep. Mark Walker (R-N.C.) told NBC News that it appeared the “gunman was there to kill as many Republican members as possible.” Walker, who was at the practice for the upcoming annual congressional baseball game in Alexandria, Virginia, confirmed he was “shaken but okay.”

“Punch a Nazi”.

“Anti-Fa”.

Hello, Liberals – when so much of your side is awash in demented hatred (the real thing, not the “disagreement with our narrative is hate” thing that so many of you jabber about), and given the instability wrapped in entitlement that so many people on your side have, what do you think is going to happen?

Be careful out there, Real Americans.  It’s gonna get worse before it gets better.

UPDATE:  While Berg’s 19th Law is still in effect (“Nothing the media writes/says about any emotionally charged event – a mass shooting, a police shooting, anything – should be taken seriously for 48 hours after the original incident.  It will largely be rubbish, as media outlets vie to “scoop” each other even on incorrect facts”), the shooter’s Facebook page indicates he is a Sanders supporter.

UPDATE 2:  The WaPo has ID’ed the shooter as a 66 year old Illinois man.

UPDATE 3:  As usual, many on the left are acting like poo-flinging baboons.

UPDATE 4:  James Hodgkinson is the name, and this is from his Facebook page:

Apparnetly “& Co” is “All Republicans”.

Clearly, we need universal background checks for Democrat voters buying guns.

Netflix edits history – cutting out the part of a 20-year-old Bill Nye episode about there being precisely two genders.

Because science!

(Note for bobbleheads:  It would be appropriate for Nye to explain why he’s reversed course; since he styles himself a “Science Guy”, perhaps he’d include some evidence that led to his conclusion, rather than just a perfunctory flush of the memory toilet.