Western Rifle Shooters Association

Do not give in to Evil, but proceed ever more boldly against it

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Vanderboegh: Now That's A Letter to the Editor

In response to this column on the Lexington (KY) Herald-Leader's website praising the Quisling AHSA organization and calling for "some intelligent compromises to protect responsible gun ownership and make communities safer," Mike Vanderboegh replies:


TO: Tom Eblen, a Kentuckian who ought to know better.

Dear Tom,

Let me introduce you to the Law of Unintended Consequences.

Sez you:

"If Second Amendment absolutists keep standing up and daring others to pry their guns from their "cold, dead fingers," eventually somebody's going to do it."

Ah, the big, bad gun "confiscation" boogeyman.

It may scare you. It may scare certain weak-kneed "sportsmen" willing to compromise our rights for theirs. And, perhaps, it may scare some poorly educated children under the age of twelve.

It does NOT scare us, the intended target of your editorial missive. The way we see it, "eventually somebody's going to TRY to do it." Liberals' biggest problem (and perhaps yours as well) is that they're always extrapolating from their own cowardice. They think that if the government told them to do something, they would do it, so everybody else will too.

Wrong.

Let's boil down the threat of gun confiscation to its mathematical essence:

1. There are as many guns in this country as there are people, something close to 300 million.

2. No matter what law you pass, some percentage of American gun owners will refuse to give theirs up, even if the penalty for doing so is death. Shall we say 3 percent of 100 million gun owners? That's the same percentage as active combatants in our first Revolution, so let's say that's 3 million "pry it from my cold dead hands" types.

3. Now, I'm sure you will agree (intellectually at least) that a man who is willing to die for his beliefs is most often somebody who is willing to kill for them too. This being the case . . .

4. When the government comes to take these citizens' guns, the citizens -- these 3 percenters -- will do their dead level best to kill the thugs sent to do so. Some of them will realize that killing the bureaucrats who sent the thugs is probably a good idea too, so a number of bureaucrats will die. Some of these citizens will also realize the justice of killing the tyrant politicians who told the bureaucrats to send the thugs, and that's even more dead added to the butcher's bill.

On a more personal note, an even smaller (yet still significant) percentage of these citizens will remember that Bill Clinton expanded the laws of warfare in the 90's to include the news media of your enemy as a legitimate target of war, so a number of reporters, editorial writers (uh, what did you say you do for a living?), anti-gun bloggers, and perceived "traitors to the Republic" will die as well, even if (as I'm sure it is in your case) they don't deserve it. I mean, I'd never shoot an editorial writer myself, I have too much love for the 1st Amendment. However, there are others out there who doubtless lack my scruples, especially when they're being shot at themselves. And since Bubba Bill already said it was OK, they'll think, "Hey, why not?"

All told, gunnies and gun grabbers, the casualties will be at least in the low millions making it the worst war America has ever fought -- indeed, the dead would total more than all of America's wars combined. This is especially true since we "cold dead hands types" intend to make it more than a one-to-one ratio. And, you may remember, we're the ones with the firearms already at hand and the ones more likely to know how to use them effectively.

5. Given that, and we understand it even if you don't, please refrain from trying to scare us "bitter enders" into compromising our God given rights. It can't be done. You can't convince us, you can't intimidate us and we're not going away. You can kill us, but you can't change our minds. Thus, stacking up millions of dead bodies in your proposed civil war seems an odd way to ensure "public safety," especially if one of those bodies is unintentionally yours. Is this really what you had in mind?

Welcome to the Law of Unintended Consequences.

Sometimes, my young editorialist, there IS no principled middle ground and to stand there is to invite being shot at by both sides with equal gusto -- and I don't mean by mere words and phrases.

Thus endeth the lesson. I hope now that I've explained things in the light of day that you'll recover soon from your silly fright at the big, bad, bogus boogeyman of gun confiscation.

Because it ain't happenin' - not without the worst bloody fight you can possibly imagine.

Have a nice day. ;-)

Mike Vanderboegh
PO Box 926
Pinson, AL 35126
GeorgeMason1776@aol.c
om

13 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Well said Mr. Vanderboegh, it seems to me this is the current tactic used by the "gun grabbers" now, compromise. I recently read an editorial in the Chicago Sun Times calling for us to meet Major Daley halfway and compromise with common sense gun control. My reply was we have been compromising with these people since the sixties. What has been their compromises - nothing. I think they understand that when you advance an agenda there is no compromise. I think we have slowly learned that now. I for one will not give an inch to these people anymore..

May 28, 2008 at 4:24 AM  
Blogger chris horton said...

Great letter. Thanks for sharing.

May 28, 2008 at 9:29 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Wow! What else can I say? Nice work.

May 28, 2008 at 5:35 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I like the vigor of your comments Mr. Vanderboegh. Thanks for posting CB.

What is left after principles are compromised?

Answer: Nothing. Chicago is a shining example of that. Folks are being thrown into jail there for such silliness as disregarding the annual gun registration sham. Fascism on parade and the sheep seem not to mind a bit. I have a few friends there and they seem oblivious...

If one determines it best to compromise ones principles, then one did not have principles in the first place, but merely (in)convenient thoughts.

Das Katze

Do

May 29, 2008 at 1:09 AM  
Blogger idahohunter said...

What Mike said! But where is "the line in the sand?" How much "infringement" do we tolerate? For some months I've been reading Mike's and David's blogs ans editorials, and the comments by the usual people. won't mention names but the same 5-6 people. Are you ready to shut up and put up? How much more is required before we change things? I'm only 52 but no longer recognise the country I'm living in.I can't believe a man( I use the term loosley) like bho can nominated for POTUS. How many of our liberty's must we loose before we act?

May 29, 2008 at 4:03 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

idahohunter said...
"For some months I've been reading Mike's and David's blogs ans editorials, and the comments by the usual people. won't mention names but the same 5-6 people."

It seems that way sometimes, except . . . Remember how I always put my email address and PO Box on the end of my stuff? I get all sorts of responses through snail mail. Between that and personal email, I'm convinced there are a LOT of lurkers out there who read my stuff, copy it, put it out on their own personal email lists or even download it, xerox it and distribute it to their friends by hand. We are more numerous than we think. -- Vanderboegh

May 29, 2008 at 11:55 AM  
Blogger chris horton said...

I can confirm that thousands of people read Mike's Writings.

MANY more than just 5 or 6.

May 30, 2008 at 1:09 AM  
Blogger zach said...

well done.

May 30, 2008 at 6:44 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Very good letter to the editor. Unfortunately, those who are vehemently anti-gun will either lack the comprehensive capabilities to understand your reply, or will have the audacity to think they are the only ones in the "right" and that no one should ever have the gall to disagree with them.

A long, long time ago and very far away when I was young and naive, I thought my politics were liberal. Heck! I was for coed dorms and the Pill, and at that time period, I was looked askance at more than once for espousing those beliefs. However, through the years, from being around "liberals" and reading and hearing their philosophies, I have decided the only thing they are "liberal" with is enacting laws to deny my "liberal" bent.

If you will check several dictionaries copyrighted after, oh say, 1980, you'll find that the true meaning of "liberal" (without restraint) has been replaced with the usage nowadays of "liberal" -- none of which are "without restraint."

May 30, 2008 at 6:07 PM  
Blogger Randall J Powell said...

Dear Mike,

I am one of the lurkers! I must thank you, you have given me hope. several months ago I discovered your work, via KABA.com, it has been a refreshing education to say the least!
RJP

May 30, 2008 at 7:11 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

No matter what law you pass, some percentage of American gun owners will refuse to give theirs up, even if the penalty for doing so is death.

For _all_ laws, the penalty is always death.

Sometimes that is also the penalty for passing a law. Some people (e.g., legislators) should keep that little fact in mind at all times.

June 10, 2008 at 9:13 PM  
Blogger AgPilot60 said...

["For some months I've been reading Mike's and David's blogs ans editorials, and the comments by the usual people. won't mention names but the same 5-6 people."]
This gets around more than you think. I send all of Mike's stuff I see to many on my mailing list and I know they send it on also.

June 12, 2008 at 5:48 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

If the goal of the elite is to reduce world population by 80%+, I don't think they will mind loosing a few insignificant thugs of their own along with a few patriots. Seems like a fair trade for their agenda. So from the perspective of the elite, the casualties are acceptable. From the perspective of the Thugs, it is a workplace hazard and I doubt anyone would want that job. The founding fathers were British citizens so what they did was fight their own countrymen and military. I hope we have the spinal cord to do the same when the time comes. the killing of millions innocent people overseas with efforts funded by our tax money, the millions given away by the USA to other countries, the rape of the public treasury for bankers and corporations, using USA assets to guarantee the debt and the forced servitude of our children and posterity in a future tyrannical government should make the people rise but I'm not seeing it.

January 31, 2009 at 4:19 PM  

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