looking at the scope of things

there’s supposed to be a sixer here today…

…but there won’t be.

in case you’re curious, it was going to be about the companies that go above and beyond inundating you with emails about black friday and cyber monday and how the former lasts till sunday and the latter till the NEXT friday, which burned me for something i wanted but never mind that now.

no, i broke the sunday sixer tradition because for the first time in ninety-five years the new york times ran an editorial on the front page because they thought it was THAT damn important to address the issue. they feel that all americans that have such assault rifles should simply “give them up for the good of their fellow citizens”.

fuck you, new york times – do you know how much that shit costs?!?

a rare bit of personal info here – i own two small ak-47’s. i don’t call them “small” because they’re a minor weapon or any less deadly than a full size. au contraire – they’re every bit as deadly, have bullets that can still kill somebody after going through several walls, and are small enough to carry in my backpack. in fact, by texas law because they were manufactured with pistol grips i can legally carry them around in a backpack in public, over thirty rounds a piece in each.

(speaking of the one on the top and the middle – ain’t texas fun?)

i don’t own them for home protection…if i shot an intruder in the hallway one of the rounds could easily fly through him, a couple walls, and still wing the boy. i also don’t own them because of my constitutional rights – ’cause i’m not part of a “well regulated militia”, as the amendment ACTUALLY fucking says.

(note to all those who hide behind the second amendment to own insane weapons: before the phrase “the right to keep and bare arms” is the phrase “…a well REGULATED militia” – who the fuck did you think was gonna regulate it?)

no, i own them because they’re FUN. sure, in a pinch they could kill somebody. but i bought them for one reason – the same reason we have big ass speakers, big ass rims, and big asses – because they’re cool, they’re fun, and if you can afford to have them in your world, as an american male, you’re pretty much driven to do so. period.

but changing gun regulations won’t fix shit. “if guns are outlawed only outlaws will have guns” the old sticker says. true – if ANYTHING is “outlawed”, and you OWN it, you are by definition an “outlaw” because that’s just another word for “criminal”, or somebody who breaks the law – and owning illegal shit is…well…ILLEGAL. but guns won’t ever be outlawed in america (and sure as fuck not in texas). why? because there are more guns in the u.s.a. than any other five countries COMBINED and that’s if you use up one with russia or china. and extra regulations won’t do shit because people will just take the gun from somebody who fit them…three of the last fifteen “mass shootings” (i.e. more than four people wounded) were done by people who boosted the gun off a relative who was perfectly law-abiding, sane, and able to purchase said firearm without a hassle. shit, if i had the dough i could have another assault rifle and hundreds of rounds of ammo in my car within ten minutes of getting out of my car in the first place.

welcome to america!

if anything, not to flaunt my inner redneck here, i think MORE guns is the answer. while i don’t ascribe to a lot of the myths about us texas folks, we are a seriously gun loving culture. have been forever. when gun violence happens in texas, it tends to be epic – dead presidents and fifty year old conspiracy theories and “i’ll climb a clock tower” kinda shit…and all that’s left behind is spent shell casings, news stories, and a couple shallow unmarked graves in the woods just outside of nacadoches, texas with bodies that still had fresh grass stains on their knees from a grassy knoll in…you know what? just ignore everything after “new stories”.

moving on…

…shooting en mass doesn’t happen in texas because even insane people realize charging into a crowded spot in texas you will more than likely be outgunned just by the average citizens there – and they’re right. nobody would try that shit here.

but if y’all wanna try making things harder, go ahead – i guarantee, along with a pay raise, congress will tack on a grandfather clause like they did with the brady bill, where all my shit stays legal ’cause i already have it. plus, most people driven to do this kind of shit are gonna find a gun SOMEWHERE because they’re crazy enough to do this kind of shit. and a note to all my colleagues in the media (which i feel i can refer to you as “colleagues” since i used to do this shit and might have even taught some of you at the collegiate level): stop referring to it as “gun violence”. the GUNS aren’t violent…the people that use them are. and more people are killed in any given day by cars in this country than guns, and yet cars are still legal – so let it go.