Don’t Feed the Bears…..

In my last post, I wrote about our growing insistence on penalizing literally millions of Americans for the actions of a very few psychopaths who kill for reasons we begin to understand only after the slaughter.  There are vast reserves of folks who do not like guns, have never owned one, and believe they are inherently evil.  These folks remind me of the bears that inhabit or are moving into parts of our country.  Most folks who can read a cereal box, know you shouldn’t feed the bruins, as this only encourages them to become bigger and bolder nuisances.  This lesson is sometimes lost on the firearms industry, usually as a result of increasing profitability and the need for happy boards of directors.

I am a member of the NRA and am deeply committed to the preservation of the 2d Amendment.  I support other firearms advocacy groups, some of which choose to meet the anti-gunners on their level with hype and sensationalism.  When we check reason at the door in our arguments, we are feeding the bears, which as mentioned above only makes them more of a problem.  The following advertisement is lifted from the official magazine of the NRA, the excellent “American Rifleman”.  Bear in mind that Gen. George S. Patton, a fellow who knew a lot about a lot of things related to combat and warfare once described the M-1 rifle as, “the greatest battle implement ever devised”.

For those of my readers who share my affinity for tri-focal glasses, the last statement in this advertisement says, “The CQB brings the action of an M1A with the modern technology to give you the speed and versatility for close quarters battle”. This from an absolutely excellent manufacturer of firearms competing with other manufacturers of quality firearms in America.  Here we go, feeding the bears.  It is a short jump from a fine weapon for close quarters battle to “assault rifle”.   After all, it is black, clip fed, polymer stocked…….see yesterday’s post.

Another  phenomenem is this business of silencers.  The bears, when not watching gangster movies where assassins dispatch their targets with silencer equipped handguns, are busy ruminating about the need for silencers.  Along with glasses, my hearing is shot, courtesy of firearms and artillery pieces strategically located in sunny Vietnam many years ago.  With absolute, field tested certainty, I can attest that very,  very few of the many deer that I have killed over the years heard the shot that killed them.  If they did, the noise was the least of their immediate concerns.  There are reasonable justifications for the legal possession and use of silencers, and in excess of forty states have approved their use…….but you must know they attract the bears, especially when screwed onto a black rifle or semiautomatic handgun.

The only effective counter to the woefully uninformed cadre of anti-gun politicians (bears) is the calm, reasoned destruction of their ridiculous premises with solid statistical data and factual rebuttal.  It would certainly help if the industry and our advocates would carefully consider their approach to protecting our freedoms.  Gen. Patton also said, “never let the enemy pick the battlefield”.  We will not stifle the anti-gun bears by suggesting that a silencer equipped M-1 rifle is ideal for close quarters battle.  This premise puts us squarely on their battlefield.