For years now, since around 2003, I have been writing how 90 million gun owners must have the affirmation of their right to carry a concealed or open carry handgun wherever they have a right to be. This is because the affirmed citizen is an asset to a community, and as such, must be affirmed in places presently restricted to honest citizens. This freedom becomes a problem for bureaucracies who compete for the affections of the sovereign.
These only make everyone - including law enforcement - look powerless. Police have no duty to protect individuals from the criminal acts of others, and cannot be everywhere anyway even if they did have such a duty. Thus, criminals see their targets as prey and the system as absent just long enough. Every single time a violent act is completed, the criminals are proven correct on that assessment and every single violent criminal shooting proves gun control a failure.
But we
are powerful, that is, when the law is invoked and respected enabling citizens and law enforcement work together. I emphasize,
when the law is respected. One such law is the right to keep and bear arms. Confiscating guns is to ignore the second amendment and why it was put there long before there was an organized police force. It is because, then and now, the target is the first line of defense.
The fact is that 48 states have some form of provision for concealed carry of handguns, and the majority of states affirms an adult citizen's right to carry concealed. Those lawmakers have not been given a cause to regret that affirmation. Unreasonable laws such as not being respected in carrying near a school or on college campuses vex the personal independence which would clearly discredit most of the programs in place. Armed citizens would -- how should I say this -- let the cat out of the bag, spill the beans, of how personal independence can and does do a rather good job of fighting violence.
And here is the best part: it is not whether our servants know it, it is that
thugs know it. Remember that a majority of states know it.
In refusing to be convinced of our authority and of the practicality of a ubiquitous armed citizen, bureaucracies insist on their continuing survival at the expense of the very people they serve, squeezing citizens out of the process as essential to official prestige. This is evident in disaster management as much as it is in gun control: take the citizen out of the equation and bureaucracy seems to shine, but this occurs at the expense of the community in terms of delays, excessive costs, and loss of confidence in government.
But citizens can have confidence in governments if the servants will get smart and stop being so self-dealing. Officials cut the citizen out, then say citizens are incompetent. There are just some things where the people do it better.
Will the incoming Republicans understand this?
Armed citizens on civil aircraft must be affirmed if you really want airline safety. I doubt very much if armed citizens would object to a momentary screening when their handguns are welcomed aboard and bad guys are recognized and not allowed on board. Isn’t that discernment a good idea? The best system, of course, would be a working relationship between screeners and gun owners in security and not as foes for a product of a general insecurity, having frozen citizens out. Screeners can stop suspicious characters as well as suspicious luggage and cargo, while admitting armed citizens who are the sovereign of this country. That's the part which seems to be left out.
Remember two things:
- A majority of states affirms concealed carry throughout their state, with various agencies who quarrel with that and refuse armed citizens, and thereby invite danger. Think Virginia Tech with its violence and the Annie Le fatality long after Cho paid them a visit. Many students are knifed and not shot. Other college campuses continue to have violence in spite of anti-violence programs.
- If thugs are convinced that crime is reduced by armed citizens, why is any agency holding out on the citizen being armed?
The armed citizen is the most direct, due process, lawful and non-violent first step back to smaller government. For more, go to
Nationwideconcealedcarry.com
