Wednesday, January 9, 2013

The Gun Show


First and foremost, I completely believe in the validity and importance of the Second Amendment. The fact that the federal government hasn't ever created any meaningful restrictions and essentially left it up to the states to decide their own gun laws is one of the distinguishing qualities that makes America truly "free". If you are a law abiding citizen, I believe you should be able to own a gun if you choose to do so. In fact, I believe you should be able to own any gun you want. But what about an AK-style assault rifle with a 100-round drum magazine? Isn't that unreasonable? Is wanting to have sex with an attractive partner unreasonable? Didn't think so.

What I do not agree with is how gun lobbyists like to shit on the First Amendment in order to ostensibly validate the Second.

That being said, here are some observations;

1. The majority of guns that are manufactured today are made with the ability to at the very least incapacitate people. These are guns that are used by police, military personnel, and civilians. Rifles and shotguns made for and typically used by hunters are also considered here because the threshold of delivering "lethal force" to even the smallest game is enough to injure a person.
2. Almost all of these guns will never be used for their intended purpose. By this I mean that if you own a gun, you probably will not ever use it to shoot someone.
3. The one area that falters every time is personal responsibility. The Second Amendment gives you the right to bear arms. It does not, however, give you the right to be a fucking idiot. Unless you live alone, or are fairly certain that your significant other isn't planning to commit murder, BUY A GUN SAFE. Seriously. It is that easy. If you have kids and you keep unsecured arms in your home, you probably deserve what's coming. Even worse is if your small children KNOW where you keep the weapons. It's the equivalent of giving an orangutan the keys to a Boeing 747; it requires a level of skill, understanding, and sense of responsibility that they simply do not possess, so bad things happen. I will end on this point because most of this blog is dedicated to how most people lack basic common sense, but had Nancy Lanza kept her arms more properly secured (without her kid knowing the combination), authorities might have had a greater opportunity to prevent the Sandy Hook massacre....


4. But Sandy Hook could not have been prevented. People are searching for answers as to how to prevent future massacres. In fact the media is salivating over issues like failures in the mental health system and gun control laws like a pedophile talking about Disney movies. The simple fact is that no matter how strict our gun laws are, if someone is unstable and sick enough to want to massacre innocent children, they will find a way to do so.


More on this later.

Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Life, as Described by Charlie Sheen: A 23rd Century Prophet in a 21st Century World; Vol. 1- The Sound, the Fury, the Suitcase

I wrote this two years ago and then forgot I had a blog.

No matter your preference for descriptions (addiction, narcissism, meglomania, etc) that have been tossed around about Charlie Sheen, but I think we can all agree that him completely losing his mind is the greatest thing to happen to his career;

1. Being high on life is an ironic statement; "I'm on a drug. It's called Charlie Sheen. It's not available. If you try it once, you will die."  
2. Drug use is not only acceptable, but necessary for greatness, if greatness is defined by having functioning extremities; "I probably took more than anybody could survive. I was banging 7 gram rocks. Because that's how I roll. I have one speed. I have one gear: go. The run I was on made Sinatra, Flynn, Jagger, Richards look like droopy-eyed, armless children."  
3. Booger sugar binges make you imagine awesome battles of earthworms vs. dragons; "I fire back once and this contaminated little maggot can't handle my power and can't handle the truth. I wish him nothing but pain in his silly travels especially if they wind up in my octagon. Clearly I have defeated this earthworm with my words -- imagine what I would have done with my fire breathing fists."