The real problem... is XXX violence....

  Yesterday were marches against GUN violence, I didn't join, because I believe in violence (it does exist) and I know the government can't protect me from it. Especially when I might use it to protect myself or others.  If I would use a gun or something else, not really important, just know that I would not be a gentle man if called upon to destroy something destructive. I grew up on heroes. Lots of heroes and lots of violence all for the good... Ajax, a large rock, William Tell crossbow, Robin Hood a long bow.  The weapon isn't so important the intent is. So governments go all the way to Nukes, and subtle poisons, or strange unknown weapons. But as I listened and commented on the discussion about the EVIL AR 15, military grade firearm (spoken by folks that haven't ever been a functioning military grade expert) I started to realize that Assault Rifle has reached the status of an idol.

   An inanimate object revered for mystic super powers of death and destruction, in other words an idol of worship.  Both the Gun folks and the Anti-gun goofs have elevated it way up there. Most real gun people know it is a tool, a toy, and a trial, but used properly no one needs to get hurt because it exists. Unless you really do think it is an idol of worship, then you will get hurt by it. The problem lives in the person or people that think it has intent. I have carried one like it for years and years, and seemed to be sleeping with it more than I was with my wife, periodically. I also know it doesn't do well against tanks and aircraft and trucks. I know that it may jam, break, misfire, or disappear into deep dark waters or mud when most inconvenient. One of Murphy's rules.

   I know the anti-Gun forces really believe in its mystic powers - they never give up their guns, just make the little guy, the worker, the slug, the unworthy must give up their guns so they have no power. If I were as terrified of failure as they are, the elite, nobles, special people - I might think I need those evil AR platform guns carried by my expert professional heroes to save me and mine. They really do bow down to those inanimate objects and pray they will be there when the crisis comes.  Then because they believe that power comes from the barrel of a weapon they crush the opposition... until they run into people of will to resist... and they are never ready for that. Oh, there are FBI special squads, SWATs and real assassins working for the government goofs, and they will and do kill and are seldom held responsible - but it doesn't look like any group that need force to rule will last long if the people have values stronger than the folks that think they are in charge.

   I am a fat little old man, but I don't get my power from idol worship, nor my guns.  I get all I need from the Bible, and many other readings and experiences in my life and the histories of others. I do want protection for the students in schools, I want to charge school boards and administration with failures to provide such protection. I also want the same folks to provide a quality education since I am robbed to pay for it. But if you have massive demonstrations in worship of the mystic power of the gun and not in getting those sick and sickening people that attack the defenseless help and rescue from their own demons... then I am sure the problem of mass deaths isn't going away.  Somehow the media, entertainment and educational and journalism have corrupted the whole way of thinking about everything and there doesn't seem to be any answer except to worship and lock up the mystic powers of those inanimate objects built for war, almost, but so evil regular folks can't be trusted with them.

Okay, I am now for Gun Control, and the restriction on AR type Assault Rifles from the folks...

  First, if you are so ignorant (lack knowledge) that you trust the government at any level to protect all you love you shouldn't be allowed to touch a weapon. If you are ignorant of why there is a 2nd Amendment for the original Constitution, you aren't ready to be trusted with a weapon. If you are sure that limiting the number of rounds will prevent mass shooting in the future, you shouldn't have access to weapons that could make such a slaughter. If you think that my deciding to not own an AR platform rifle means at all my years of instructing on it, running training around it, and carrying it into battle for the government will disappear when you outlaw those to civilians - you shouldn't be making decisions for others to live under. So if you can't pass a test that asks about what you are making a logical choice about the prohibited weapon, you can't have such a weapon and can't vote on this matter.

   I would love to point out, especially when people use the last Assault Weapons Ban, ten years and no mass shootings in the schools. That there were also no Alien Spaceship Battles that Earth lost, thanks to the International Space Agency, during the same period. I would also be sure to mention two states that have banned or registered all Assault Weapons and large magazine have not enforced any of the law against the population that are not in compliance. I suspect those states do not want a Constitutional Test case in the courts.

  I suspect that home schooling and private schools will produce the best thinking young people and the continued disarming of all those that just don't know enough to be entrusted with arms or the vote will increase in speed. Until only the noble class of folks armed with knowledge and responsibility will be continuing the American traditions... by some time soon after the newest AWB, the current Constitution will be replaced and we will be stuck with our enemies among the sheep in the fold. Then it really will get bloody. Does anyone study History any longer? 

Happy anniversary, yes, really have a happy anniversary...

  Today is the official date, government approved, and done without US Army assistance nor resistance, the day I stood before a Methodist Minister with my girl friend and became very much more married. My father, mother, sisters and a niece were there to officially witness and support the event. Mother went a bit beyond the call to make sure we had a wedding cake and something to drink a toast with and to capture pictures. We were blest. For it doesn't always happen so well, today marriage seems so difficult but I and my wife had our own parents and others of examples of solid long lasting unions. We were blest.

  I believed at the time, and teased my wife about it, that I wasn't going to live to forty. Now we are married forty-six years. We are thankful and know that we have been blest.

  I meander the kitchen making my oatmeal, and she steps in and out making hers, a dance we are comfortable doing, speaking in tongues and chuckles, pointing out the future, thinking about the past.
She isn't cute, her long black hairs has been cut long ago, it has grayed and now silver. I don't wear a uniform nor get up too early to go do PT. She has grown to a beauty that only God and I know, and she shares her loves.  God and I get her fears, but she loves well and deeply. We will always keep working on and around the fears. I would hope the world would find true love, for it is there. It is everywhere.
 
   Did I mention? We are blest.

What are you basing your life upon?

  The Gun Violence, Gun Control, Abortion and generally, how one is supposed to live, and why doesn't the government do something to fix it  --  has come up again. All those questions, debates and solutions circle around seemingly going no where. So I see no need to expound on any of them, as soon as you said 'the government should' you have left the playing field.

  Everything that should be better can be if everyone steps up and does the correct important things in their life and with their family and friends and to all strangers they meet. If I don't get high on drugs nor alcohol, then drunk driving won't happen. There already is law, but it is behavior that makes the best things happen, not law. Most law is punitive, some faceless fellow is going to punish you and you should be afraid. That doesn't motivate me, anyone else out there deciding that they will be good because they will be punished? No, most people are in denial, it will never happen to me, goes their thoughts.

   I wonder if any of us have looked deeply into why we do what we do, your life is patterned on a tale of success and goodness, isn't it? When you turn on the television to see Law and Order, you find the criminals hiding, lying and lawyering up. Yeah, then for a bit more drama, you have the 'good' guys cheating on their loves, the job, the rules and in general only a little bit better than the accused.  But watching the actors never registers as unacceptable behavior, someone is killed during a story, then you see the same actor in another story very much alive - you now, in your mind, think being killed isn't real. Don't teach bad behavior, teach and sell only good behavior. I am sure I have never had the romances illustrated on entertainment, really.

Go get them, Grasshopper.

   I will always go back to the fact that I am responsible for my behavior - the wonderful and the totally stupid - it all belongs to me. Do not make the same fool action that hurt the universe again. Don't repeat errors, make different ones but doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome never works there is science and engineering proofs if you care to look them over. There are people that blame the LEFT, the RIGHT, the NRA, the government and all kinds of places to lay blame for all that seems to be wrong and go wrong. Like making my shot, I am the one on the weapon and I am the only one responsible for where the bullet strikes and what happens when it does. Many may care, or very few, and the media may make a lot out of it, nor not, I will always remain the person responsible no matter what anyone says. It will never be the few semi auto rifles that hurt people, out of the millions used responsibly daily. It would be the shooter's fault.

   If you watch enough, for some reason you think you aren't living up to your mental model, making love to hundreds of beautiful women(?) only in the lives of the LOST. You wouldn't even know their names.

Might as well give up... so I did, going in circles has only a limited life...

  The Gun Violence debate is posed by the other side as a problem with the guns, access and danger... but the problem is Cain killed Abel with a rock. David killed Goliath with a stone. And current culture believes more in Road Rage than good manners. Entitlement, I have a right to be rude, crude and lewd... or so I think they think. Have a quiet conversation about the power of words with the intelligent ones, about how easy it is not to use vulgarity, profanity and obscenity. It is likely they are all telling you to take from the forbidden fruit - you won't die.  As justification for their poor choices and why I should be accepting of it - that is unacceptable. Go away!

   So we are now engaged in a conversation, a debate, a rude shouting down match between the forces of good and evil, the left and the right the up and the down. Boring, nothing new, nor better will come from it. Well, you will take care of your portion of the conversation and the conflict, and I will take care of mine and I firmly resolve that I won't kill any children because they haven't gained their maturity. Also, I know they have much more to bring to brighten our world. I also resolve to resist stupidity as I constantly run into it. There is a lot of fantasy in the media, and fairy tales have been my favorites for years and years... but I never dreamed nor aspired to be the Prince, I was more the bookworm in the stacks. I took bat, ball, glove and a good book to Little League... notice I didn't play much after that.

   Lovely wargame I was playing, I picked the name Ajax, and went about gaining experience and points learning the rules and meeting folks from far away online. But I started noticing empty castles, where players had stopped and now the castles were raided, looted and burned - no human life left inside. The computer machine age will miss human beings one day. No poetry, unfortunately I see the children I teach in Sunday school are already lost to poetry, as they sink deeper into their digital distraction device. If I were a betting man, I would say we (the tech savy civilized world) have no way to resist our end.

   When we think another government agency, law, rule or tax is going to fix everything we are lost. How does the FBI, get into defending schools from raiding savages... just because the communications seem so quick? That doesn't mean you have control of anything. I can focus on the front sight, and I don't need optics or electronic enhancements (I just am not going to shoot that far). But I know that the government can't make my shot, only I can. Over and over, I hear Liberty Mutual will fix a flat, and I laugh because thinking only the Xperts and government can handle anything means we should return to a King, a royal lineage.  Don't study History, you might find this human interaction at every level hasn't changed. Personal responsibility, personal action and don't stay on the beach waiting for orders... it is a kill zone.

 

Off to get a haircut...

  And was going to stop and get some Drambuie. And look at how much money is in my accounts, seems the property tax notice arrived at my home. So on post, to the base exchange I go. Sit and wait for the shop to empty a bit, then get up and go looking for the alcohol. I find some interesting furniture, a perfect bench for the porch, some assembly required. So I order it and intend to pick it up after the haircut.
  While I am there I decide to look at the rifles, ugly black ones especially. They have the medium level ARs but then I see a CZ, 805 Bren S1 Carbine, and ask to look at it.  It costs a bit too much, but I like many things about it and see its potential. Talking to the salesman about the price, he said they had to send a different colored one back, seems they didn't think they could sell a six thousand dollar semi-automatic. Not in the exchange for sure.

   On my way out of the exchange I find the alcohol I was looking for, so picked it up. Paying the nice lady at the checkout I wondered when they were going to stop moving all the stuff around, being confusing to us seldom shoppers. She understood, probably heard it before. I did get my haircut, and didn't get my eyebrows trimmed, love the Mentat look.
   In the real world, larger than my little piece of it, the question remains, what are we going to do to stop Gun Violence, and I know as soon as they use that term it is an anti-gun agenda. Not a real search for curing evil, bad manners, disrespect and increasing the love for all mankind... so whatever comes up, won't work. The answers have already been given to the question, but no one likes them.

Monkey see, Monkey do... childhood truths...

  I am sure that sales all know that seeing something produces desires, even if you aren't directly selling a product... They have college courses on that idea. My monkey see, monkey do was my mother telling me that just because someone else did it didn't mean I had to do it... and then she told me how my grandfather had told my grandmother he didn't have to show her how to drive, she had been watching him for a few years already.

   The mind and vision link is amazing, and does make the transfer of knowledge or skills quicker than verbal pictures alone. But having taught a few things in my life, most of them critical survival skills, I learned early on "Do not ever show the wrong way to do anything"  The mind will always use what it saw, no matter how many words were used to say do not to do it that way...  Watching a governor say that our current culture has been corrupted by visual images in media and video games is only partially true. If your favorite actor never got to act again because he died in a motion picture, or if he was wounded and would ever after limp or was missing parts in following performances, the illusions about fighting and combat and death being painless and without cost would fade quickly. But your mind notices that he or she is alive and well next week or the next episode. Real mortality like real morality isn't very forgiving, but fantasy remains a fleeing truth forever.

   So we kill constantly on entertainment media, shooting guns out of hands and capturing the bad guys by smarts is so old Western fables, we want much more blood and lust. But the real people of the old west, would really shoot you if they thought they should. They had higher standards of polite conduct and social interaction. Y'all need to really study Mark Twain's works from his world. And doctors are giving us medications to cure our pains far beyond our ability to observe the patients constantly as their mind is bent, and the side effect lists and warnings become greater for the lawyers to profit from...  but the most troubling thing to me is the lack of faith among the many that really should know better. No God, no creator, no judge, no savior and no reason to be your best always... no reason not to grab all the little monkey sees and wants.

   Often asked recently, how did we go from so many more firearms fifty to sixty years ago, to fewer now and more school shootings. One TV show about schools and teachers had a teacher bringing a gun to school taking it out and threatening his students and then firing some blanks... I as a real student would have gotten up gone out of the classroom, to lodge a complaint and not worry about the rest of the day, I would have even gone outside and smoked a cigarette. But the writers wanted you to think the students would have been terrified of the gun - gosh, I was a much tougher kid than that, much. And I was more terrified of pretty girls and being thought of as weak.

   But I am almost sure I am going to be pounded for being so sure that God loves me, than accused of sexual misconduct or planning a bloody act of terror. Where did those strange values come from? And I won't make the evening news, I like shooting, guns and good people. I won't be news worthy...