Another Fudd Speaks

I know many have already taken good shots at this guy, but what the hell...

I consider my right to bear arms one of my basic freedoms, but not the only one, so buckle up, gun nuts. I happen to think other amendments to our constitution such as Number 1 (freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly and petition), 13 (abolishing slavery), 14 (equal protection under the law), 19 and 26 (right to vote for women and all citizens over 18) and others might actually be more important than Number 2.

Ah yes, the ever-convenient straw man of "gun nuts only care about the Second Amendment." Bill Schneider must not be a very well-read person, at least as far as today's gun culture and gun bloggers' representation of that culture goes. The fact is if you read just about any of the gun bloggers out there, it's a safe bet that you'll find 99 percent of them commenting regularly on violations of other constitutional rights and general civil liberties. And what's with the putting all those other amendments ahead of the Second anyway? I don't see the 13th, 14th, 19th or 26th Amendments under attack here. I don't even see them in danger. So I guess you could call that a red herring of sorts, but no matter what you call it he's still way off base. If some tyrannical regime started trying to undermine all those other rights, just who is going to change that? I would think it would be people with — wait for it! — guns. So when you look at it like that, it would seem that what those "gun nuts" — you know, the ones Bill Schneider so cluelessly and self-righteously derides — it would seem that what those people say is absolutely true, that the Second Amendment is the guarantor of all the rest, which, ergo, makes it the most important. You'll note I didn't mention the First Amendment as not being under attack...because, of course, it was under attack during the campaign. And as evidenced by the Democrats chomping at the bit to bring back the Fairness Doctrine, there's going to be a sustained attack on the First Amendment for at least the foreseeable future. I wonder why Bill Schneider didn't say anything about that?

I’ve learned that gun nuts are scared, and I am, too, but for a different reason. They’re terrified about our new president sending out a flock of black helicopters to confiscate their guns--or at least make it harder to buy them.

Yeah, well, considering the new president's abysmal record vis-a-vis gun rights, can you really blame them?!

That doesn’t scare me in the slightest, but I am terrified about the corporate greed that has assassinated our economy, the health care crisis, those trillions of federal deficit, a rapidly widening income gap, and escalating poverty and homelessness sweeping our country as we squander billions overseas to fight unwanted, unwinnable wars or for “aid” to countries that consider us the Great Satan.

So it would seem all that high-minded concern for constitutional rights was just a load of shit...because as far as I know, nowhere in the Constitution did the Founding Fathers give the government the power to reign in supposed "corporate greed," or address some supposed "income gap." As far as the trillions of federal deficit...well, I seem to recall the last time the balanced budget amendment came up for a vote in Congress to send to the states for ratification, it FAILED due to lack of support from the Democrats...you know, the party we just handed the government lock, stock and barrel to. As far as that "unwinnable war," well, maybe not so much.

Guns, guns, guns--that’s all that matters to these people.

He says that, of course...but it isn't true, is it?

Even though I think gun nuts deserve our respect, I don’t always respect their tactics. Witness the recent Cooper Firearms fiasco. The gun nuts went on a mission to crucify Dan Cooper and destroy his company for expressing his support for Barrack Obama. In their words, they “Zumboed him.”...
...gun nuts have no right to destroy a person’s career and an entire company of innocent people because of one person’s political views. This is America, land of the free and the brave, where we don’t persecute people for their beliefs.

Actually, Dan Cooper deserved exactly what he got. What Dan Cooper did with his actions boiled down to betrayal of anyone who owns a boomstick. High-minded Fudd martyr rhetoric be damned.

Somehow, we need to separate the two issues, guns and hunting, which continues to my main criticism of the National Rifle Association (NRA). America’s most powerful lobby should stick to protecting our gun rights and not pretend to represent hunters.

Oh, THAT's real nice. Tell me who it is throwing who under the bus again? Which faction is it that's trying to split the gun owners again? Seems to me this guy just wants to sit on his ass and just let the gun-grabbers come after the politically incorrect guns, so naively assuming that they'll leave his intermediate sniper deer rifle alone. He made a gallant effort to make it sound like he gave a shit about everybody else's guns, but it's pretty obvious he doesn't. Hell, he even admitted as much when he said the only reason he owned a gun was for hunting...in the very first paragraph of his self-righteous screed.

I’ve learned that most gun owners aren’t hunters and some have nothing but scorn for hunters because we’re soft and care about other amendments.

Soft? Maybe. Care about other amendments? Well, ultimately, that's not true...because once the Second goes, it sets a precedent for all the rest and makes it that much easier, as the oppressors with the guns will say to the ones without the guns, "What are you gonna do about it? You don't have any means of resistance!" Not that I'd expect some simple-minded Fuddite asshole like Bill Schneider to figure that out for himself, though.