I hope this finds you well and good and loving life.
Does This Smell Funny To You?
Last night my wife and I had our tradational Friday night throw down. Nothing too insane, but we did have a few shots of Jagermeister, a nice stir-fry and a lot of laughs. Okay, five shots.
At one point I asked her what she thought of my blog. As she is my wife, my beloved companion, the light of my light, and my only follower at this point, her opinion trumps all.
She liked it but she recognized that I was holding back being funny. Let a bit more of your personality come through, she advised, and stop holding back on the funny stuff.
She was one hundret percent right, of course. I really have been holding back on the humor. Really, I was writing like I used to when I was the Viewpoints editor for the Kennesaw Sentinel. My blog doesn't sound like me, it sounds like me blogging.
On That Note
Lets Fix That. Here goes my favorite joke.
The Pope and Queen Elizabeth are standing on a balcony, waving to the crowd. The Queen leans over and whispers “Bet you a fiver I can make every Englishman out there cheer for a full minute with just a wave.” “You’re on,” says the Pope. She gives an enthusiastic wave and the crowd cheers for a full minute.
The Pope scowls, being out a fiver. “Say,” he whispers to the queen. “Double or nothing I can make every Irishman out there cheer for an hour with just a nod.” “Your on,” says the Queen.
So the Pope headbutts her.
Rimshot!
Guns, Guns, Guns
Sometimes I hate being an advocate of gun ownership.
Guns kill folks. Every school shooting, every cop who gets shot, every time an idiot illegally sells a gun to another idiot who causes trouble, I find my belief in the right of Americans to own and carry firearms shaken.
But I do believe that the right to bear arms is an important part of the Constitution. I believe in the right of Americans to hunt game, to compete in target shooting, to defend themselves from intruders and criminals and the odd rampaging bear.More than all of this I believe that citizens have to have the ability to defend themselves from their government. Sometimes governments go bad and if you have an unarmed citizenry then an entire nation can fall to a few bad men in power.
And yet well meaning dolts go wrong with guns all the time and innocent people die.
Lets strip this issue down to its absolute basics. First, lets remember that I am not talking about criminals possessing firearms - every reasonable person is against that. We have laws in place that address that issue. No one is saying that criminals should have the right to bear arms, and no one at all is trying to justify violence committed by criminals. Obviously everyone but criminals are against gun crime.
I want to focus here on when lawfully obtained weapons are used for criminal, even negligently criminal purposes. That includes all the tragedies that happen because of careless gun owners, or drunks with legal weapons, or any of the infinite variety of good old stupidity that cause lawful citizens to cause tragedies.
So what is the base of the problem in America? Other nations with private gun ownership have no where near the difficulties that we do here in the States. What are we dong wrong?
As I see it, the problem is two fold - American gun culture and weakness in how we regulate firearms.
Under The Gun
I have been selling guns at one pawn shop or another since the late 90s. I have handed many guns to many people, either buying them for the first time or redeeming pawns. Most gun people are just normal folks who hunt, or target shoot, or who own a firearm to defend their home.
Lots of gun people, however, are wierd about guns.
I can say quite honestly that more Americans than you would care to tabulate have what can only be called a gun fetish. I have seen the gleam in their eyes, heard the language that they use when describing the firearms they want. Its sexual, pure and simple. Gun fetishists are into the look, the feel, the sensuality of firearms. They want one that makes them feel real or alive or invincible or sexy. A gun is a tool, a dangerous one that, in the wrong hands, one that creates misery with misuse -- but people look past that because, damn it, were talking about guns.
I have had people come in to my shop and ask to see a dozen guns, only to then tell me that they were ineligible to own a firearm in the US and had just missed holding one. I have had people come in to my shop and look me in the eye and tell me they knew nothing about guns but wanted one that looked good in their hand, something sleek and black. I have personally made gun sales based only on a color or a style or, in one memorable case, the wood grain pattern in the but of a shotgun (full disclosure: it was great looking gun). I have seen couples buying household guns with the furtive excitement most reserve for buying sex toys. I have seen all of this again and again and again.
These folks come by their fetish honestly. The mythology of the gun is pervades the American consciousness
Ask any amature historian and the'll tell you that our country was carved out of the land of other people by Americans with guns. In our national imaginings the Westward Expansion of our nation was led by cowboys with six-shooters and the early repeating rifles - and really, who ever made guns sexier than cowboys? Think of the pagentry we associate with guns, the gun flourishing popularized by Westerns and the old dime store novels. Think of how modern movies and music make guns such an object of power and desire.
We have a gun fetish here in the US, and it makes us put more logical considerations aside. We have to have guns because . . . well, we just have to have them! Sure they do all kinds of bad and nobody wants to see somebody they like get shot but, well, we just have to have them! That's fetish mentality, the same one that makes politicians risk their carerrs and families on sneaky sex. The same mentality that sends celebrities out looking for tranny hookers, that drives otherwise sensible folks to the worst sort of dangerous companionship. We just have to have it!
And as far as I can tell there is nothing to be done about the American Gun Fetish. It is just a part of our national character. Someday we may grow out of it but I certainly can't picture it.
Regulation
A gun is a tool, a dangerous one that, in the wrong hands, creates misery with misuse. They must be regulated, and they are. But for the most part we make a piss poor job of it.
As someone who buys and sells guns I am here to say that our current system is antiquated and inadequate. If I take a gun across the counter it gets logged into a Gun Book. This is an actual paper ledger, and it must be done in handwriting. We do a backround check, but that only asks for the number and types of firearms being transferred (hand guns or long guns). If a gun dealer lost his gun book, say in a fire, you could eventually collect all of the data you lost but it would be a painstaking, time consuming process. It lacks redundancy, and in the computer age that's all but unforgivable.
In the US all you need to own a gun is a valid ID and a clean record. You don't have to know a thing about guns, you don't have to know how they work or what the parts are called or how not to shoot yourself in the face while you clean it. Can you imagine buying a car and having the right to take it off the lot if you didn't know how to drive? That's how we regulate guns in the US.
Sometimes I believe that we keep our gun regulation basic and sort of old fashioned out of a sense of nostalgia. We romanticize the old west, buying shotguns from the Sears Robuck catalog or the local dry goods store. Its a mentality our legislators must grow beyond.
What I do believe in is a major change in the way that we handle the sale and licensing of firearms.
Traveling Now Saves The World, Pt 1
Here is what I propose, what I have proposed for years and years: license guns like cars.
If you want to own a firearm, you go when you turn 21 and take classes in safety and legality. If you pass a written and practical test, you get a license - a real damn license, by the way, with your picture and an official seal, not the current carry permit that looks like you made it at Kinkos. When you go in to buy a gun, you show your license and the seller scans it. The gun purchase goes through the ATF, who gets a record of the transaction, including the make, model and serial number of the gun purchase. Screw up (by which I mean commit a crime, transfer a gun illegally or similar) and you loose your license and the ATF impounds all of your firearms. Ta daaaa!
I know the American political landscape and human nature too well to believe that this will happen, but a blog can dream, can't it?
Saturday, June 25, 2011
Saturday, June 18, 2011
Idelogical Gumbo
Welcome back! Thanks for looking in.
Bad Ideology Gumbo
From CNN's Political Ticker Blog:
So we should put all the science on the table and let high school students decide? So astrology, phrenology, dowsing, psychic surgery, crystal healing . . . we put all of this in front of the 9th graders and let them decide? Do you think they will choose the ones that have a real basis in the scientific method, or the ones with the fewest crunchy bits to memorize so they can rely on nice easy mid-terms?
Young minds need to be protected from garbage thinking. There is a reason why we regulate education, why its arguably the most important job of government. Young people have no real basis to decide what is good science or bad science. That's why they go to school, to learn how to think critically. Garbage in, garbage out. Eventually that generation of poorly educated dupes will be the ones in the emergency room, the research laboratories, and The White House. We have the power to think them to think, or teach them the substitutions for thinking.
The political right wing of our country has become a bad ideological gumbo of anarchists, entrenched racists, greed-fueled robber barons, theocrats, false historians who want the world to go back to a fictional Leave It To Beaver paradise, culture warriors, and just good normal folk. The good normal folk deserve better representation and much better bedfellows. We all do.
The real problem is that America truly needs a good, intellectual, ideologically sound right wing. Someone should work towards limiting government spending, to keep our government to a manageable size, to keep business regulations reasonable. And, as of this writing, we do not have that right wing.
Currently Digging
I am going to do a spot in my blog where I can list things that I am, indeed, currently digging. Truth in advertising!
Currently digging:: Madeline, Trader Joe's, Not The Nine O'Clock News, my super cute wife's new haircut.
Bad Ideology Gumbo
From CNN's Political Ticker Blog:
"I support intelligent design," Bachmann told reporters in New Orleans following her speech to the Republican Leadership Conference. "What I support is putting all science on the table and then letting students decide. I don't think it's a good idea for government to come down on one side of scientific issue or another, when there is reasonable doubt on both sides."This is a fine strategy for eliminating any chance of the United States being competitive with other nations in science and technology, and therefore in the economy of tomorrow. There is nothing to intelligent design, no one in the scientific main stream thinks so. By handicapping tomorrows potential scientific minds with the garbage of mythological "what if"s we retard the chances of our nation developing as a technology superpower. Our next generation of highly pious wrong-thinkers can possibly get work driving trucks and cleaning floors for foreign tech firms who will literally be creating the future.
So we should put all the science on the table and let high school students decide? So astrology, phrenology, dowsing, psychic surgery, crystal healing . . . we put all of this in front of the 9th graders and let them decide? Do you think they will choose the ones that have a real basis in the scientific method, or the ones with the fewest crunchy bits to memorize so they can rely on nice easy mid-terms?
Young minds need to be protected from garbage thinking. There is a reason why we regulate education, why its arguably the most important job of government. Young people have no real basis to decide what is good science or bad science. That's why they go to school, to learn how to think critically. Garbage in, garbage out. Eventually that generation of poorly educated dupes will be the ones in the emergency room, the research laboratories, and The White House. We have the power to think them to think, or teach them the substitutions for thinking.
The political right wing of our country has become a bad ideological gumbo of anarchists, entrenched racists, greed-fueled robber barons, theocrats, false historians who want the world to go back to a fictional Leave It To Beaver paradise, culture warriors, and just good normal folk. The good normal folk deserve better representation and much better bedfellows. We all do.
The real problem is that America truly needs a good, intellectual, ideologically sound right wing. Someone should work towards limiting government spending, to keep our government to a manageable size, to keep business regulations reasonable. And, as of this writing, we do not have that right wing.
Currently Digging
I am going to do a spot in my blog where I can list things that I am, indeed, currently digging. Truth in advertising!
Currently digging:: Madeline, Trader Joe's, Not The Nine O'Clock News, my super cute wife's new haircut.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Welcome to the Traveling Now
Welcome to The Traveling Now. Thanks for looking in.
Long Story Short
I was driving to work one day, listening to news on the radio, yelling at my dashboard. I don't recall what the news story was about but it was pissing me off something fierce. Its been two or three months since that day but I remember thinking that the entire world was populated by people determined to slap some short sighted "solution" on some problem that would likely please a group of equally short-sighted voters. No one seemed to understand the issue, that's what I remember being pissed off about.
I recalled that there was a time when I had a way of expressing my displeasure with this sort of thing. This sort of internal, existential displeasure. At one very happy time in my life I was the Viewpoints editor for my college paper. When I would hear about issues that were making me crazy, I would give them some thought, write an editorial about it, and see it in print a few days later. It helped. Writing it helped, seeing what I wrote in print helped.
Still driving, still listening to the radio, I thought about all the thousands of blogs that were out there right now. What if I started a blog? What if I wrote about all these things that pissed me off? I immediately felt better. Just the idea of starting my own blog helped me relax. Writing a blog was the Move.
Three months of agonizing over a title later, a title fell in my lap and I was ready to go. That was yesterday.
The Traveling Now?
Yep. The Traveling Now is a concept from a book I finished yesterday, I Shall Wear Midnight by Terry Pratchett. In the book (which concerns, among other things, witches, loyalty, duty and the best way to liven up a funeral) certain witches have a way of communicating in which they use a bit of "friendly time" to have a kind of zero-duration conversation unhindered by the usual problems of time and space. The name of the communication space was The Traveling Now and the second I heard it I knew that was the name for my blog. This is a space for communication, a bit of friendly time where I can pass ideas around.
Speaking Of
I read yesterday where Terry Pratchett began the process of committing assisted suicide at a clinic in Switzerland. That makes me very sad. Of course, the fact that M. Pratchett suffers from early onset Alzheimer's disease makes me very sad indeed. Ultimately, while I have the right to be sad about one of my favorite author's misfortunes, they are his misfortunes and he has the right to deal with them however he sees fit. I respect whatever decision he makes.
I believe assisted suicide should be legal here in the United States. The main arguments against the legality of the procedure seem to be religious (which is a non-argument, ultimately) or procedural. Folks seem to fear a brave new world where heroic life saving measures are given up for the expedience of just letting borderline case individuals die, or where people are pressured into committing suicide by the uncaring machinations of some dystopic death panel.
If the US had a system of assisted suicide it would invariably be abused. Every system gets abused. Create a program to feed the poor in foreign countries and dictators will steal the food and hold their people hostage. Create a charity and some detestable bastard will find a way to scam it. Kind acts are turned around, honest people are duped, our legal system is vulnerable to greed, medicines developed to help the depressed and confused get taken for thrills. Take away every good thing that can be used for bad ends and you are left with nothing. Rather than surrendering to the possibility of corruption we should build the best institutions we can and remain ever vigilant against the actions of evil men.
Ultimately the argument has to be "Does a man's life belong to himself"? If the answer is yes - and the answer is yes in any world you would want to live in - it must be okay for him to choose to end it himself. This is not to say that life should be thrown away casually or thoughtlessly. But when someone comes to what must be the incredibly difficult decision that they don't have anything else to live for, that the pain is too great and the chance of recovery is nil, then we as a society should not only respect that decision, we should help find a way for him to implement it with dignity.
Liberal? Conservative?
A bit of pragmatism, please. Adopting a ready-made world view is simpleminded and, to my way of thinking, sad.
My liberal friends find me conservative. I believe in animal testing, genetically modified food, gun ownership, the NHL. I believe that two adults should have the right to have a mutually agreed upon fist fight without legal ramifications. I'm for raising the retirement age and making welfare and disability scams a felony.
My conservative friends find me very liberal. I'm for nationalized health care, mass transportation, forgiving third world debt, conservationism. I believe that any two consenting adults should be allowed to have a civil union with all the benefits and responsibilities of marriage. I'm for exponentially increasing what we spend on education and paying for it by leaving off of one or two of our less convenient wars.
Ultimately, I believe that the world is a very complicated place, that it has always been complicated, and that every generations dream of an earlier Golden Age where everyone was happy and life was uncomplicated and straightforward is a fiction. I believe that modern problems have to be approached with pragmatism and careful analysis. I believe we have to appreciate mankind - the good and the bad, and the very good and the very bad - in full.
Long Story Short
I was driving to work one day, listening to news on the radio, yelling at my dashboard. I don't recall what the news story was about but it was pissing me off something fierce. Its been two or three months since that day but I remember thinking that the entire world was populated by people determined to slap some short sighted "solution" on some problem that would likely please a group of equally short-sighted voters. No one seemed to understand the issue, that's what I remember being pissed off about.
I recalled that there was a time when I had a way of expressing my displeasure with this sort of thing. This sort of internal, existential displeasure. At one very happy time in my life I was the Viewpoints editor for my college paper. When I would hear about issues that were making me crazy, I would give them some thought, write an editorial about it, and see it in print a few days later. It helped. Writing it helped, seeing what I wrote in print helped.
Still driving, still listening to the radio, I thought about all the thousands of blogs that were out there right now. What if I started a blog? What if I wrote about all these things that pissed me off? I immediately felt better. Just the idea of starting my own blog helped me relax. Writing a blog was the Move.
Three months of agonizing over a title later, a title fell in my lap and I was ready to go. That was yesterday.
The Traveling Now?
Yep. The Traveling Now is a concept from a book I finished yesterday, I Shall Wear Midnight by Terry Pratchett. In the book (which concerns, among other things, witches, loyalty, duty and the best way to liven up a funeral) certain witches have a way of communicating in which they use a bit of "friendly time" to have a kind of zero-duration conversation unhindered by the usual problems of time and space. The name of the communication space was The Traveling Now and the second I heard it I knew that was the name for my blog. This is a space for communication, a bit of friendly time where I can pass ideas around.
Speaking Of
I read yesterday where Terry Pratchett began the process of committing assisted suicide at a clinic in Switzerland. That makes me very sad. Of course, the fact that M. Pratchett suffers from early onset Alzheimer's disease makes me very sad indeed. Ultimately, while I have the right to be sad about one of my favorite author's misfortunes, they are his misfortunes and he has the right to deal with them however he sees fit. I respect whatever decision he makes.
I believe assisted suicide should be legal here in the United States. The main arguments against the legality of the procedure seem to be religious (which is a non-argument, ultimately) or procedural. Folks seem to fear a brave new world where heroic life saving measures are given up for the expedience of just letting borderline case individuals die, or where people are pressured into committing suicide by the uncaring machinations of some dystopic death panel.
If the US had a system of assisted suicide it would invariably be abused. Every system gets abused. Create a program to feed the poor in foreign countries and dictators will steal the food and hold their people hostage. Create a charity and some detestable bastard will find a way to scam it. Kind acts are turned around, honest people are duped, our legal system is vulnerable to greed, medicines developed to help the depressed and confused get taken for thrills. Take away every good thing that can be used for bad ends and you are left with nothing. Rather than surrendering to the possibility of corruption we should build the best institutions we can and remain ever vigilant against the actions of evil men.
Ultimately the argument has to be "Does a man's life belong to himself"? If the answer is yes - and the answer is yes in any world you would want to live in - it must be okay for him to choose to end it himself. This is not to say that life should be thrown away casually or thoughtlessly. But when someone comes to what must be the incredibly difficult decision that they don't have anything else to live for, that the pain is too great and the chance of recovery is nil, then we as a society should not only respect that decision, we should help find a way for him to implement it with dignity.
Liberal? Conservative?
A bit of pragmatism, please. Adopting a ready-made world view is simpleminded and, to my way of thinking, sad.
My liberal friends find me conservative. I believe in animal testing, genetically modified food, gun ownership, the NHL. I believe that two adults should have the right to have a mutually agreed upon fist fight without legal ramifications. I'm for raising the retirement age and making welfare and disability scams a felony.
My conservative friends find me very liberal. I'm for nationalized health care, mass transportation, forgiving third world debt, conservationism. I believe that any two consenting adults should be allowed to have a civil union with all the benefits and responsibilities of marriage. I'm for exponentially increasing what we spend on education and paying for it by leaving off of one or two of our less convenient wars.
Ultimately, I believe that the world is a very complicated place, that it has always been complicated, and that every generations dream of an earlier Golden Age where everyone was happy and life was uncomplicated and straightforward is a fiction. I believe that modern problems have to be approached with pragmatism and careful analysis. I believe we have to appreciate mankind - the good and the bad, and the very good and the very bad - in full.
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