Armed with a single-shot .22-caliber rifle, an eight-year old in Arizona ambushed his father, shooting him in head and chest, pausing to reload between each shot. He then methodically killed a second man who lived at the home, again with shots to the head and chest, again pausing to reload between each shot. Despite blind and immediate media speculation of child abuse, there is nothing to indicate the father was anything other than a loving father and hunter who taught his son to shoot so that they could share his love of the outdoors. The moral of the story? Love your kids. Teach them to shoot if you want. But always lock up your firearms.

In Alaska, Gov. Sarah Palin's controversial helicopter-borne culling of wolf packs has proven to be life-saving for an Alaskan caribou herd in danger of extinction. At times, shooting even beautiful wild things is a better option than doing nothing. Her pragmatic approach to wildlife management offers a caribou herd a second chance. Don't look for the animal rights groups that attacked Palin for the culling program to congratulate her on it succeeding.

Advocating the shooting of people, however, especially the President-Elect, isn't a good idea, as some N.C. State students are no doubt learning.

State has what it calls the Free Expression Tunnel where students are encouraged to communicate controversial ideas and thoughts without criticism as an exercise in free speech. That free expression stops when racial slurs are spray painted, along with the graffiti "Shoot Obama." The NAACP is now involved, pushing for the students involved to be punished by the University since criminal charges will not be filed. The right to free speech is not a freedom from responsibility.

But what about shooting some friends of the President-Elect? Is that permissible?

Someone pointed out that Bill Ayers, Bernadine Dohrn, and others in the domestic terror group called the Weather Underground formally declared war against the United States, but that they were not aware that the WU ever signed a formal peace treaty. If someone decided to take a shot at members, could they argue they were targeting known enemy combatants?

I strongly suspect that defense would utterly fail in court, so I'd advise not testing it. Besides, if someone was successful in terminating them as they planned to do to 25 million of us, what would President Obama do? He'd no longer be The Fresh Prince of Bill Ayers.

And speaking even more of Obama and guns, it appears that his campaign and election have done wonders for gun and ammunition sales, even as his policies seem ripe to wreck the rest of the economy.

Gun shops across America are seeing a massive increase in sales of both guns and ammunition as a result of Obama's historic victory. His record of supporting bans on all semi-automatic firearms and all handguns, his stated desire to reinstate the ineffectual Clinton-era ban on assault weapons, and fears that a Democratic Congress may attempt to raise prohibitive taxes on firearms has led to a shortage of certain kinds of firearms and ammunition across the country. In particular, semi-automatic rifles that would potentially be affected by such a ban are difficult to keep in stock, and many retailers are back-ordered.

I only how much more sales will increase when Americans learn that Obama actively sought to undermine the Second Amendment as a director of the rabidly anti-gun Joyce Foundation.

Quite by accident, Barack Obama seems poised to do more to increase gun ownership by American citizens than any President in history.

If I wasn't so bitter and clingy, I'd be thrilled.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 10:49 AM | Comments (12) | Add Comment
Post contains 607 words, total size 4 kb.