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Tuesday, August 18, 2009

I am all for open carry but...

I think this is a bit much...

Man carrying gun attends Obama protest
(edited headline to be more accurate).

Not the best place to be promoting open carry rights, me thinks. I understand that he was not in the convention hall, but it still sends the wrong message.

ha, now we have conspiracy theories about people like that dude...
http://www.doomdaily.com/2009/man-with-earpiece-and-handgun-at-obamacare-event-%E2%80%94-provocateur-or-patriot/

seems I shouldn't have started this post, it just gets weirder and more silly the more you read.
Although, both sides have been planting people at these "town hall" meetings lately, to make the other side look stupid and also people to make their side look good.

Coming soon, a town hall meeting consisting solely of plants from both sides...! ha.

Personally, I would be more afraid of Squeeky Fromme than some of these guys. If you go back and look at some of the stuff that the Mason crew believed, I doubt they are very happy with this President. And she has precedent on attacking a President.

update: Murdoc sort of summarized my feelings, I don't know exactly how I feel, but in general it has the ability to get out of hand.
http://www.gunpundit.com/3393.php

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

"I have an open mind, but I draw the line at some things . . ."

That's foolish sentiment unless that line drawing has some reasoning and isn't arbitrary. Sometimes we have to be adults about issues.

In this case, open carry was not illegal, those carrying did so in a safe and lawful manner, and no one got hurt. Laws were being followed. There is no story here and no cause for hysteria.

The suspicion that things "might get out of hand" isn't particularly motivated by any of these events. We can always replace what actually happened with any imagined alternative scenario we want if we're interested in worst-case scenarios. This doesn't usually get us anywhere. To focus on those scenarios that assume lawful citizens will act like violent felons simply because they are openly carrying the tools to do so is a little insane.

Let's just say "I'm all for open carry as is the state legislature in the state in which these events took place" and call the matter settled.

That said, in Georgia, this kind of thing runs afoul of the "public gathering" rule and would be prohibited.

--Kerrminator

sstc said...

oh Kerrminator... I don't think I was advancing hysteria or being arbitrary.

Its not a question of it being legal, its a question of what I think people should be doing to advance their cause.

I think open carrying in that manner was worse for the open carry movement than not open carrying. By get out of hand, I did not mean that we would have some sort of shooting rampage by open carrying people, but that others might take the actions the wrong way and respond inappropriately. In this case, you had media trying to pass off the African-American man as white to promote the existence of some sort of anti-African-American tint to the open carry people. Other groups used it to showcase the extreme nature of the opposition to their views which could incite others to take action (there I go again with worst case scenarios...).

Murdoc had a good follow up post that I mostly agree with, http://www.gunpundit.com/3401.php. (I however disagree with the statement about semi-auto "assault"weapons, first, "assault" is not defined, and second, they can be plain fun to shoot at balloons or paper targets) The quote from Sebastian's blog is a good one which you may want to understand.