Only A Gun Can Protect You From The Impending Collapse.
Several weeks ago, I posted a column about a GOP lawmaker in
Michigan who walked into a legislative session carrying an AR-15 on his back
and a Glock in his waist. He wanted to let everyone know that he was an ardent
supporter of 2nd-Amendment ‘rights.’ This idiot then went home, left
the guns out on the kitchen table and drove off to go somewhere else. Whereupon
someone broke into his home and swiped the guns. The cops believed that the
burglary occurred because the bad guy had gone to the politician’s Facebook
page and seen this idiot walking through the State House toting his guns.
I thought this dope in Michigan had committed the
stupidest bit of behavior by any pro-gun politician this year, but I warned my
readers that there would no doubt be even dumber examples coming right along.
And yesterday what I predicted turned out to be true, thanks to a state
legislator in Georgia named Matt Gurtler, who now holds the title of dumbest
pro-gun politician of the year. Now remember, my award cuts both ways and I
have already given out a ‘dumb’ award to a state rep in Massachusetts who is
vociferously anti-gun. But let’s get back to the idiot from the Peach State.
Gurtler has decided that the shutdown of public offices
that process concealed-carry licenses makes residents of those jurisdictions
more vulnerable to the COVID-19 virus than if they were to stand in line
waiting for their CCW applications to be processed and approved. After
all, how can you compare the threat of the ‘Chinese flu’ to the threat of not
being able to protect your family and your home?
So, this moron is proposing that the Governor use his emergency
powers to override the State Constitution and allow residents to walk around
with a concealed weapon whether they have been granted a CCW license or
not. He puts it this way: “We need to suspend enforcement
especially during the state of emergency, when so many individuals need to be
able to defend themselves and their families and their loved ones and their
property.”
Now I’m going to pretend that my
name is Michel Foucault because I want to engage in a brief effort to deconstruct
what Gurtler says. Note that he believes not just in the idea of armed,
self-defense, but he wants to extend this belief to include the ability of
anyone to walk around in the street with a gun. Not just in the street, but
maybe to the supermarket, maybe to the liquor store; in other words, to any
location that is still providing an essential service or selling products which
everyone still needs.
The whole point of the 2008
Supreme Court decision on the 2nd Amendment is that the majority opinion clearly states
that every law-abiding person living in America has Constitutional protection
for keeping a loaded, unlocked handgun in their home for personal defense. In
Georgia, this decision would apply to everyone who legally owns a gun, or at
least a handgun.
But for reasons that can only be
explained in terms of where Gurtler’s IQ lands him on the bell curve, he
believes that folks can only protect themselves, their families and their
property if they can walk around with a gun. Which, by the way, happens to be an
idea that Gun-nut Nation has been pushing for years.
Georgia and other states have seen
a spike in gun sales over the last few weeks. According to the manager of a Florida
shop, “Our sales are up 80 percent, with a huge increase in first-time buyers
who are worried about martial law, economic collapse, unemployment, shortages,
delinquents roaming the streets.”
This comment takes me back to a
wonderful movie, War of the Worlds, which I saw when it was released in
1953, then Spielberg redid it in 2005. Is there the slightest chance that the
guy knocking on my front door is anyone other than the kid delivering my pizza with
anchovies and extra cheese?
