Stop Being Afraid of Guns: Matt Clark and Rich Hoffman talk about gun free zones on WAAM radio
Matt Clark had me on his WAAM radio show in Ann Arbor, Michigan recently to discuss some of the hot stories of October 2015. There was enough to cover to last a lifetime of live radio—the stories and their frequency are exponentially increasing by the moment, and it’s a lot to keep track of. Without talk radio, it would be nearly impossible for the average person to follow everything. That’s why I’ve always been a fan of talk radio, because you can get a lot of news provided to you as other tasks are done, such as driving, changing the oil, and installing new hot water heaters. Talk radio is miraculous in its ability to cover a lot of ground quickly, and on Matt’s show, he is one of the best. Typically in a short hour, he can hit a lot of topics in a very fluid manner—and when he has me on with him—we really hit the topics in a furious fashion. That broadcast can be heard below.
Toward the end of the broadcast there were a couple of callers that Matt wanted to get on the air. I am typically sympathetic to callers because it takes a lot of guts to call into a radio show, to sit on hold for up to an hour not knowing when the host will put on the air to millions of potential listeners. If the callers are respectful I typically don’t interrupt them because it’s important to get their view points out on the table. A police offer took issue with my proposal that regarding gun control, my more guns are best approach was something he had a problem with. Matt and I let him talk which directed him to the real point he was trying to make—but it was near the end of the show, and we didn’t have time to expand down that line of thought. The cop of course felt that civilians were not as equipped to handle a crises situation as compared to law enforcement. As Matt and I had been talking about gun free zones needing more independently armed citizens to keep things in check, the officer wanted more police on staff to protect schools from violence.
Well, more cops won’t work because they are too expensive. There is a cost for safety and security, and if it does incur too much of a burden, there needs to be other alternatives. The solution to gun violence is not more gun control laws, or more cops patrolling the streets and schools—its more armed citizens who will do the work for free not in a reactionary way, but a proactive way. A cop in the school in Oregon would not have stopped that violence. A well armed student could have. More cops working off tax payer funds are not the answer in almost every situation. We do need the police, but more for the report that happens when violence occurs so that courts have evidence to look at. So I don’t agree with the nice guy who called into Matt’s show. From his point of view, more cops in schools make sense—because he doesn’t care how much police cost an area in increased taxes. To his mind taxes can be perpetually raised so long as safety is the focus. But that’s just stupid.
There is always a danger when tragedies occur for the timid minded to seek out more government to provide security. More cops in schools are an expansion of government. Whereas a more open gun carrying society would provoke cheaper and more direct security in a laissez-faire kind of way which big government types simply don’t understand. If progressive minded people are not tampering with the lives of other people, they don’t feel secure themselves, so my typical laissez-faire style of security is something that drives them crazy. Gun laws in America should essentially be the same as the laws that govern business and commerce. Less laws and more responsibility invoked at the point of contact driven by self-preservation.
There was a lot right that occurred during the “Wild West” period in America of which guns were such a part of the mythology of western expansion. To consider the effort it took for Americans to load up in covered wagons and head west for up to a year of travel at roughly 20 miles per day with all the dangers that such a journey provoked, and that within 100 years of that type of settlement, there were railroads, cars and airplanes invented that could connect all that open space seamlessly is quite a miracle. Forget about who the Native Americans were—whether they were caretakers of Mother Earth’s land, migrant Chinese people, left-over Viking warriors, or a lost tribe from Israel, the effort of frontiersman is one of the great stories of human innovation and tenacity ever conducted by free people. Guns evolved from muzzle loaders at the start of western expansion and ended as a pretty significant technological innovation resulting in lever-action repeaters and the Colt .45s that tamed the West into one of the freest land masses on the face of the planet. Progressives hated the Wild West because it was a period of history where laissez-faire lifestyles provoked hopes through capitalism and innovation that has never been repeated at any other time in known history. For all the barbarity of frontier life, it paved the way for a wonderful country that exploded upon the world an immense economy. Without the gun, none of that would have happened.
I am of a mind that Americans shouldn’t even have concealed carry anymore; they should make guns a part of their fashion. It should be as common to see a gun on the hip of a person as it is to see a business suit now. The American gun is a tribute to our heritage and a reminder of what a laissez-faire approach to legislation, and justice can provide a free people. As a society, we have to get away from this crap of being afraid of guns. We have to stop putting orange indicators on toy guns at Wal-Mart so not to scare some pansy police officer with a happy trigger finger willing to shoot anything that they might consider a threat. It ruins the experience for a kid of pretending that guns are real when they play with those toys. Schools need to stop trying to keep kids from playing shoot-em-up at recess by making fake guns out of their hands. Playing with guns is good for kids—they should do a lot more of it—especially boys. Avoiding guns is making our society into a bunch of wimps and it’s getting worse year by year. That’s what happens when you take advice from people like that caller into Matt’s show. More government employees and more gun laws turn our society into a much more regressive one. Aside from the obvious expensive nature of continuing to add government employees at tax payer expense, micromanaging society is an even more cost incursion that has detrimental effects on social responsibility. The 100 years where America operated as a much more laissez-faire society between the War of 1812 and the rise of the progressive era with Teddy Roosevelt in 1912 America become a global superpower. Under progressive influence, America has regressed steadily from 1912 to 2012.
2012 will be viewed as a pivotal year in American politics. Obama won a second term, Ohio’s governor Kasich lost his battle with the unions, and many of those who refused to hold their nose and vote for Mitt Romney as a Republican presidential nominee decided they had enough of politics as usual. Since 2012 the American people have started to turn more toward a desire for a laissez-faire approach to all things related to government which will increase as millenials realize that most of their educations during the first twenty years of their lives were a complete farce—they learned all the wrong things for all the wrong reasons. It is among them that they watch the big government reaction to all these failed progressive problems and are starting to consider other options. Of those options I believe we will see a new trend that guns will become more open and accepted. They should be, they are an important aspect of American culture.
As Matt and I closed out his show it was obvious that the government has well overplayed its hand in this card game called politics, and police officers have seen the last of the days where panicked parents and squishy minded voters just increased taxes and threw more bodies at every danger that presented itself. We are dealing with a whole new age in a new century, and if America is to survive, it will only do so with an overall political approach that is laissez-faire toward everything—starting with guns. Once more guns are injected into our society with more frequency, and openness–then all things related to our commerce will reflect that less restricted approach. It’s a mentality that we are missing in America that goes or comes based on how our society maintains its relationship to the gun. A laissez-faire approach to firearms is not an extreme position with equal measure against the gun grabbing liberals on the opposite side of some political spectrum. It’s not up for debate with a high low bar between positions where left and right politics meet in the middle. Guns are a part of America and there should be no apology in wanting them, carrying them, or using them. If America had that attitude presently, a lot fewer people would be dying in these mass shootings. The shootings themselves are caused by failed policies and an overly cautions society that is so afraid of guns that they can’t even allow a child to have a toy unless it’s colored in some way so not to scare other people into believing its real. Nobody should be such a bunch of wimps as to be scared of guns. Our education system has made our society that way—to our own detriment. And now its time to stop being afraid.
Rich Hoffman
CLIFFHANGER RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT
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