Valentine’s Day, specially right after work is done for the day, is the Black Friday for Gas Station Candy and Traffic Lights Flower Vendors.

Note: The information a top of this post is true…give or take a lie or two. 😀

The ending of one of my two favorite Romantic movies… actually I only have two favorite Romantic movies.

Oh hell, why not? Here is the other.

Last week, 60 Minutes did a bit on national concealed carry reciprocity.

This is the promo, I can’t embed the whole 14 minute video, but is it available on the CBS website.

The whole video was just like the promo.  It was half-truths, deceit, and condescending urban Blue State elitism.

If you are allowed to carry a gun in Wyoming (picture of a faceless rancher’s gun and ass), you can carry it on any street in America (picture of New York City).

Oh NO!!!  Those backwards, flyover country bumpkins are going to be able to carry in New York City!!!

Conservative rural states like Arizona and West Virginia allow almost anyone to carry a loaded firearm in public, while in urban states and big cities, it can be a felony.

Yes, Wyoming and West Virginia are constitutional carry states, but prohibited persons are still banned from gun possession.  Arizona requires a fingerprint background check to obtain a permit.

Watching 60 Minutes you might get the impression a person can walk out of prison, buy a gun, tuck it in his pants, and be on his merry, legal way.

This is the handgun counter at Van’s Sporting Goods outside Jackson, Mississippi, a state with the fourth highest gun fatality rate in the country and some of the weakest gun laws.

Pretty much anyone 18 years of age and not a convicted felon can carry one of these concealed weapons here in their pocket, their pants or their purse for self-defense against muggers, carjackers and other assailants.

If the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act becomes law, they’ll be able to carry them legally across state lines and onto the streets of any city in America. 

Oh NO!!!  Those backwards, flyover country bumpkins are going to be able to carry in New York City!!!

Mississippi’s homicide rate is (mostly) the fault of the Jackson metropolitan area.  Jackson, MS, is up there with New Orleans, Detroit, and Baltimore for dangerous cities.

What is the common thread?  Lax gun laws?  Nope.

A very high (black) poverty and unemployment rate combined with gang violence and drug dealing.

But have no fear, 60 Minutes won’t mention that at all.

But there is fierce opposition to it in places like California, where there are strict gun laws and concealed carry permits are difficult to obtain. It’s one of eight states that generally require thorough background checks, at least some firearms training and a proven need to carry a handgun. In another 30 states, it’s easier to get a concealed carry permit and in many of those, there’s no requirement to be proficient in the use of firearms. A dozen states have no requirements at all.

It’s not that California’s training requirements are too difficult or that they have very high standards.  It’s that California doesn’t think the Second Amendment belongs in the constitution and is a may issue state.  The Sheriff’s are given the discretion to issue permits and in most of California the answer is “No and fuck you for asking.”  It’s not safety, it’s tyranny.

Someone who lives in Nevada, who’s able to carry a loaded, concealed weapon in Nevada could now bring that loaded gun into Los Angeles, into San Francisco, and carry their loaded weapon, even though in San Francisco that’s not someone who would get a permit.

NIMBY.  Not In My Back Yard.  That is all that is.  I’ve traveled all over this country.  Is there some reason that Los Angeles, San Francisco, or New York is any different than Las Vegas, Houston, Austin, Dallas, Miami, Orlando, Pheonix, Jacksonville, Indianapolis, Nashville, Atlanta, or any other major city with a urban center in a shall issue or constitution carry state?

Of course not.

Hell, even Chicago got dragged kicking and screaming into allowing concealed carry and there has been no problem of Chicagoans with CCWs shooting each other over nothing.

But Los Angels, San Francisco, and New York City are arrogant.  They are “special” and that means the laws that cover most of the rest of America shouldn’t apply to them.  They are the Liberal Elite.

To blue state liberals who favor gun control, it may sound like a right-wing fantasy but to the National Rifle Association, which contributed $30 million dollars to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign and claims credit for his victory, it’s their top legislative priority. And with midterm elections this year, nothing is taken for granted. In 2013, a similar bill failed by just three votes.

THE NRA!!!  TRUMP!!!  DOOM!!!

As proof of injustice, the NRA and other gun rights advocates use the case of Shaneen Allen as ammunition.

In 2013, while driving from Philadelphia to Atlantic City, New Jersey, the single mother and mugging victim was pulled over with a pistol in her purse and a valid concealed carry permit from her home state of Pennsylvania.

What she didn’t know is that New Jersey didn’t recognize Pennsylvania’s concealed carry permit. So this single mom who had never had a run-in with the law spent almost two months in jail and was facing ten years in prison because she’d crossed that state line.

Pretty much that is the fear of every CCW owner.  It’s not irrational.  Do you know what states honor what permits when taking a road trip to see the Grand Canyon or Mt. Rushmore?  Hint: Nebraska and Illinois are pretty reserved when it comes to reciprocity.  Be careful in Arizona where driving on certain highways puts you on Indian land and although Arizona may recognize your CCW, the tribe won’t.

Having one standard that every state and jurisdiction adheres to is a great way of keeping people who do not want to become criminals from accidentally becoming criminals.  That’s how the law SHOULD work in America.

The large constituency for this message is a long way from the New Jersey Turnpike, in the red states that stretch from the Carolinas through the mountains of the far west. It is the political fault line of regional and cultural differences that split the country and guns are one of the triggers. They’re woven into the culture here, passed down from generation to generation in rural, remote parts of the country where dialing 911 does not always bring immediate help. To people here, whether they’re single mothers worried about robbers and rapists while driving their kids across state lines to soccer matches, or ranchers worried about rattlesnakes, guns are a security blanket of self-reliance and protection that keep them safe.

It’s not just remote parts of the country where police don’t respond immediately.  Most of Los Angeles has over 10 minutes of response time.  the NYPD is also getting slower in its response time.

Having traveled the country, it is often the places where I can’t carry a gun that I’ve wished I’ve had one the most.

But in most big cities like Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, D.C. and New York,  guns are a cause of fear and concern, not comfort. And law enforcement has lined up against strangers from far away places walking around their cities with loaded guns in violation of their own laws.

So the LA/NYC counter argument is “guns are scary.”

Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance and New York City Police Commissioner James O’Neill say their city has the most to lose. Every year, New York takes in nearly 50 million visitors from all over the country into a congested, sometimes chaotic city. Even if a tiny fraction were legally carrying concealed weapons, it would mean hundreds of thousands of additional guns for what is right now the safest big city in America.

Cy Vance is a tyrant, and despite his prejudice, we bumpkins from the South and Mid West aren’t going to start shooting up his city when we visit it as tourists.

You bring that kind of volume of firepower even with well-intentioned people– it’s gonna be extremely dangerous.

Nope.

They’re not just worried about more crime, but an increase in suicides, gun accidents and heated arguments turning into lethal altercations. And with no national database for concealed carry permits, the NYPD says it would not be able to immediately determine whether someone was legally carrying or not.

This is not a problem anywhere else in the country.  The “there will be blood in the streets” argument has been proven false.

Also, if you want to know if someone is carrying legally, ask to see the person’s permit.  Does the NYPD not know basic police work done in 38 other states?  Even constitutional carry states issue permits for people who want to travel and carry their guns.

Right now we– we have a good idea of– of who’s carrying guns. If this law passes, the– all bets are off. Anybody can come into New York City from any state and– and carry a weapon.

They don’t have a good idea or they wouldn’t have had “stop and frisk.”

I wouldn’t presume to tell the residents of West Virginia what their gun laws should be. They’ve figured out what they want there. But I don’t think they, or Congress, should be having West Virginia’s laws put on New York City.

Bullshit.  Michael Bloomberg tries to tell the rest of the nation what their gun laws should be.  As mayor of NYC, he spend NYPD money to sent NYPD officers to Arizona to try and sting a gun show.  Fuck this guy.

Also, the “right to keep and bear arms” is part of the Constitution.  The rest of us just want NYC to obey the law of the land as the rest of the nation interprets it.

The central tenet of Concealed Carry Reciprocity is that the Second Amendment gives people the right to carry guns anywhere they want but that idea is more aspiration than factual.

We just want constitution applied everywhere equally.

Absolutely not. In fact, the Supreme Court has ruled on the Second Amendment in 2008. And what the Supreme Court said is that you have a right to have a handgun in your home for self-defense. And it absolutely does not include a right to carry a loaded, concealed weapon in public. And right up until the Supreme Court says it is your right, that is a fallacy that they’re pushing, in the hopes that it will become the truth. But it simply isn’t the truth as of right now.

That’s because SCOTUS has been a bunch of pussies on this issue.  The 7th Circuit Court said the RTKBA meant concealed carry in Moore v. Madigan.

If SCOTUS did address this, I’m sure they would agree on that.  What they need to do is pull an Obergefell and force concealed carry everywhere.

As in almost all political arguments today, each side comes equipped with alternative facts and opposition research, allowing people to believe whatever they want. The NRA claims the only way to stop bad guys with guns is to have more good guys with guns — it will make people safer…and its facts, as recited by representative Hudson of North Carolina, claim it’s working.

“Alternative facts” from the people who resent being called “fake news” for their biased and partisan bullshit.

The goal is, of the gun lobby, to have what they call Constitutional Carry, which means that you– anyone can have a gun, anywhere, anytime. Because the Constitution, and the Second Amendment, in their view, says that. And so the world that they imagine is one where everyone can have a gun. That’s not the world that I think I wanna live in. But that’s the world that I think they’re tryin’ to create.

Whether people like it or not, that world already exists in many parts of the country where people are quite happy with it and so are their representatives in Congress. It’s expected that just a handful of votes in the U.S. Senate will decide whether it becomes the law of the land.

Welcome to America, come on in, the Freedoms are fine.

The whole story here is nothing but “we big Blue cities are special and we don’t want those people, the flyover riffraff to come here with their scar guns.”

I want national concealed carry reciprocity for two reasons.  Primarily, so I can travel freely throughout the country.  I want the freedom promised to me by the Constitution.

I also know that in the age of Trump, this will break so many of the big Blue elitists.

I know that when they think of outside NYC or LA this is what they think we’re all related to Cletus the Slack Jaw Yokel.  The idea of us being allowed to carry in their precious cities, even if we never visit, would be a huge kick in the teeth.  After years and years of suffering the slings and arrows of their condescension, this will we sweet.

There is nothing that Democrats hate more than being told by Republicans that the people they (the Democrats) think they are better than have civil liberties too.

The senior culture writer for BuzzFeed found a graph of the effect of having a first child on income for men and women.

https://twitter.com/annehelen/status/963107981754744832

She was clearly shocked by this.

I figured that this came from the files of “No duh!”  Really it’s from Denmark.

I thought the results of this study were pretty common sense.  Mothers generally take off more time than fathers after a child is born.  Mothers more than fathers take on the duties of caring for infants and all the little chores and duties that entails.

That time is time spent away from work and time spent away from work doesn’t pay, hence, salary goes down.  As the child gets older and mom can go back to work her salary increases again from the point where she left work to take care of the child.

Two attorneys, one man and one woman start out the same at the firm.  After five years the woman leaves to have a kid.  She comes back to work when the child enters school.  She has been out of law school for nine years but only has five years experience.  The man has been working the entire time and has nine years experience, so his salary is higher.

This all seems rather common sense, at least to me.

I don’t have the outrage that others seem to have.

This graph needs to have a subtitle for women who have children:
"Women Who Do Essential Public Work For Free"#EqualPay

— Dktr Süs⁷ (@Dktr_Sus) February 12, 2018

I realized, that is because I think like a married man.

My wife takes a hit to her salary because we had kids.  She’s better suited to stay home than I am to care for a newborn.  My salary is also double hers, so the lost of my income has more of an impact on us.  We still feel the effect of her income loss.  I have to work harder and sacrifice more to make up the difference.

That is called being in a partnership.  We both wanted kids.  I knew what that would mean to me in terms of responsibility and disposable income.

I think this outrage comes form the feminist “a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle” thing.

If you don’t truly understand that getting married and having a child is a partnership, you might see that graph as the woman falling behind.

I have a kid, my salary goes down compared to a man’s, it’s not fair.

That supposes that when my wife takes time off and doesn’t collect a paycheck, she has to go barefoot eating ramen while I have steak and buy a new gun for myself.  No,  WE make it work.

The wife takes the financial hit and the so the husband, hers directly and his indirectly, as he has to make up the difference.

Only a narcissist who doesn’t understand what a marriage and family really means gets tied up in the competitiveness between the sexes.

Maybe this explains the divorce rate.  If you are more focused on how “unfair” it is that your salary took a hit compared to your husband’s than realizing the sacrifice the both of you made, your marriage is going to go down in flames.

What I a sure of is that there is nobody worth marrying – of either gender – over at BuzzFeed.

CNN has found, much to their horror that an expert was called.

The white paper was produced by Acting ATF Deputy Director Ronald B. Turk and dated on President Trump’s inauguration day, January 20, 2017. It says the agency should consider allowing gun dealers to sell across state lines, loosen restrictions on gun noise suppressors, and pull back on its scrutiny of gun shops.

“If I am missing the mark on a major issue or disregarding a major discussion point any feedback you have would be appreciated,” Turk wrote to the lobbyist, Mark Barnes, on January 9, 2017. “My hope is that the agency can demonstrate flexibility where appropriate and identify areas for further discussion, recognizing that solving everyone’s concerns on each side would be difficult.”

The documents on the drafting of the white paper, as provided by the ATF, do not reflect any input from gun-control groups.

Exclusive: Gun lobbyist helped write ATF official’s proposal to deregulate

Of course, they are all excited/scared and getting stuff wrong on purpose (You thought I was gonna say they lied as usual, didn’t you?”

Although the finalized white paper was leaked last year to the Washington Post, it was not known that Barnes — a lawyer who has lobbied for the National Rifle Association, a gun show trade group, and gun manufacturers — had helped draft it in the first place.

Some thing are just chock-full of common sense: You are sick, you go to a doctor. Your car is not running, you take it to a mechanic. Your sink leaks, you call a plumber. So who are you supposed to call about guns and the law? According to CNN, not a Gun Layer or anybody related with the NRA.

However, after Sandy Hook, the Obama administration sent ATF agents to help Senator Feinstein and the Gun Control Groups around her to come up with the new Assault Weapons Ban bill and CNN had no problems at all.

I meant those cards you see people leave at the pump offering all kinds of very local goods and services, from handimen, house cleaning, home cooked meals, mobile car repair shop, “authentic Gucci belts for $30, how to lose 100 pounds in 2 weeks (does not work, don’t ask me how), landscaping, etc.

This gentleman here under the name of Mr. Grim 2 Da Reapa called my attention for his version of the Anarchist Cookbook he is holding. Kinda looks different from the one we knew back in the other century. As for his music, he has one song titled “Legalize it” and I will remain with Peter Tosh’s version if you don’t mind being an old fart and stuff.

Here is to  Mr. Grim 2 Da Reapa‘s best of luck. I know the music business is hard and unloving most of the time. May he succeed.