Politics

Metal detectors at the Texas capitol?

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

“Grits for Breakfast” takes a look at the DPS plan to put x-rays and metal detectors at the Texas capitol entrances.

One thing many don’t think about is the psychological consequences of such a thing:

After 9/11, the Austin city council turned their offices into their own little fortress, installing metal detectors and ceasing the longstanding practice of allowing constituents to go directly to councilmembers’ offices to talk to staff, the councilmember, etc.. The result was to make them much less accessible, more insular, and ultimately IMO more aloof and full of themselves. The physical infrastructure created to protect these “important people” more than the rest of us had an unintended side effect on officeholders and staff, creating an even more significant psychological distance from constituents than the physical one. The change dramatically altered the culture at city hall, very much for the worse as far as I’m concerned.

Indeed. One must wonder what makes them more important than the rest of us to warrant such measures? If it’s good enough for them, why not you and me? And if we went that route, what sort of world would we live in? And would it really solve anything or just amount to more psychological pain?

Even better: Maybe if legislators are concerned about security they should use some of their campaign funds to send themselves and their staff through the necessary training to get their concealed carry permits.

That’d probably do far more positive. However, I wouldn’t want to force anyone to do such a thing. If a staffer doesn’t want to do it, they shouldn’t be made to.

But for heaven’s sake, state officials shouldn’t let either fear or an overblown sense of self-importance spur security measures that degrade the fundamental culture of the institution. It’s important to protect legislators, but we hold elections every two years precisely to remind each of them that they’re replaceable. It’s not their capitol, it’s ours.

The key word is “self-importance”. If you believe you are that important that you need to work to preserve yourself, then work to enable measures that preserve yourself and enable the citizenry to do the same.

It’s my body

/ hsoi / 3 Comments

I find it odd how the liberal masses carry on endlessly about how “it’s my body” and how they should have the final say about what’s done to it, what goes in or out of it.  Then in the same breath, these people seem to also believe that more government is the answer, because when they do, sooner or later the gov decides it wants to control your body. Of course, it’s all for your own good… they’re just here to protect you. But what if you don’t want to be saved from yourself?

John Stossel writes about such government “nanny-ism”.

We’ll hear from people like Bruce Tower. Tower has prostate cancer. He wanted to take a drug that showed promise against his cancer, but the Food and Drug Administration would not allow it. One bureaucrat told him the government was protecting him from dangerous side effects. Tower’s outraged response was: “Side effects — who cares? Every treatment I’ve had I’ve suffered from side effects. If I’m terminal, it should be my option to endure any side effects.”

Indeed. I fail to see what they are saving him from. The cancer will kill him, so if this adult of sound mind makes the decision that he wants to try some new drug that could save his life, why shouldn’t he be allowed to? How much more miserable can it make his life? And why isn’t it up to him to make that choice for himself? I already have one mother, I don’t need another.

Dr. Alan Chow invented a retinal implant that helps some blind people see (optobionics.com). Demonstrating that took seven years and cost $50 million dollars of FDA-approved tests. But now the FDA wants still more tests. That third stage will take another three years and cost $100 million. But Chow doesn’t have $100 million. He can’t raise the money from investors because the implant only helps some blind people. Potential investors fear there are too few customers to justify their $100 million risk.

Way to kill innovation.

It gets worse.

The Drug Enforcement Agency’s war on drug dealers has led them to watch pain-management doctors like hawks. Drugs like Vicodin and OxyContin provide wonderful pain relief. But because they are also taken by “recreational” drug users, doctors go to jail for prescribing quantities that the DEA considers “inappropriate.” As a result, pain specialists are scared into underprescribing painkillers. Sick people suffer horrible pain needlessly.

Think I exaggerate? Check out the website of the American Association of Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) (aapsonline.org). It warns doctors not to go into pain management.

[…]

The DEA told us that good doctors have nothing to worry about. But … the DEA’s cherry-picked medical experts persuade juries that they should jail any doctor who administers higher doses of pain relief than the DEA’s zealots think appropriate. News of those jail terms spreads. Doctors learn to be stingy with paid meds.

But it’s all for our own good, right? Who are these bureaucrats to say what’s appropriate for me? Why isn’t that between myself and my doctor?

All drugs involve risk. In a free country, it should be up to individuals, once we’re adults, to make our own choices about those risks. Patrick Henry didn’t say, “Give me absolute safety, or give me death.” He said “liberty.” That is what America is supposed to be about.

Unfortunately America is no longer that. People seem to want safety over all things, and we’re willing to give up everything in vain hope of achieving it.

National Parks won’t change a whole lot today

/ hsoi

So today the new federal law change kicks in, where law-abiding citizens can continue to abide by the laws of their state.

Of course, much hysteria is coming with this, but I get the feeling this will be a lot like when concealed handgun licenses were coming about. All the predictions of death and destruction, OK Corral style shootouts in the street, and in the end the result was quite the opposite effect; in fact violent crime statistics went down. Gee.

One cool thing tho is the National Park Services website is to be updated to provide information on the laws of that particular state. In poking around this morning I’m finding the website to be inconsistent, some park entries having information and some not. If they are there, it tends to be under the particular park’s website, under Management, under Laws & Policies. Hopefully it’s just a matter of time before the entire website is updated.

A thought, on Gandhi and guns

/ hsoi

A few days ago I wrote a brief entry about the shooter at University of Alabama, Huntsville. While the entry itself wasn’t much, it’s generated quite a comment thread.

In writing one reply I was thinking about how great icons of pacifism, like the Dalai Lama, aren’t against guns. In the “Seattle Times” on May 15, 2001 The Dalai Lama was quoted as saying:

If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you, it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun.

Even Mahatma Gandhi wasn’t against guns. He understood they had a place. While I was Googling around to find some quotes, I ran across this page. A gentleman named “Peter C” wrote this:

Up until approximately 1978, I described myself as a Gandhi-an pacifist. As we were leaving an emergency doctor appointment with my doddering old half-blind father, I on one arm and my mother on the other at 11 pm that night, a man larger than any of us came bellowing in our direction — “what is this!? A wedding coming down the street!!” He was obviously… something… drunk? Anyway, I had exactly two emotions at that moment. The first was apprehension. The next was a full-fledged and absolute willingness to die in the protection of my parents. I did not care for my own life _or_his_. Right or wrong, up or down, left or right, green or yellow… I was in that moment pledged to kill or be killed. As it turns out, whether he sensed my resolve, or had a moment of clarity I don’t know, but he nearly instantaneously ceased in his bellowing and harrassment [sic] and went on.

Personally, I have reviewed my personal “peace policies” and frankly, I have a much different view today than at that time. The Indians have had done to them as bad as anything Adolph Hitler is credited in doing to those unfortunate enough to occupy his internment camps. For full documentation of British barbarities, I recommend reading Mike Davis’ “Late Victorian Holocausts” for the full telling. Could guns have prevented these barbarities? I do not know. I know that above the meditation place of the Dalai Lama is a gun. Like most things, the solutions are never one thing. Certainly violence is an act that must be considered in its practical context I believe.

But “evil” seems to be a matter of the human heart, and not born of an implement per se. The implements change, but the heart of evil changes little. Change the heart and you change the implements. I pray that we learn to change our hearts by deep meditation and thus the implements that cause suffering will therefore change to implements that create peace. Meanwhile, let’s stop being so idealistic in our focus upon the implements instead of the deeper causes of unnecessary violence.

It’s the last paragraph that is most relevant.

People want to ban guns because they believe in doing so violence will go away. Sometimes they choose their words to say “gun violence” will go away. Sure, I’ll grant that if there are no guns there would be no gun violence. I mean, we don’t have any Star Trek phasers and consequently we don’t have any phaser violence. Trouble is, while “violence” may be eliminated, “violence” is not. No gun? Fine, they’ll use a knife. Look at the UK. Ban knives? They’ll use sticks. Ban sticks, they’ll use their bare hands. What are you going to do then? Cut off our hands? then we’ll use our feet. Are we then going to cut off our feet? Because once we do that yeah… that might actually finally inhibit things. I know it sounds like a ridiculous extreme, but that is the path it takes. You can ban all the objects you want, but it doesn’t change what’s in the heart of a person. If some person is intent on causing pain and suffering, violence and destruction, they are going to do that even if the only thing they can use is their bare hands.

So yes, let’s stop focusing on the implements and instead start focusing on the deeper causes of unnecessary violence.

Giving Obama credit where he’s due

/ hsoi / 1 Comment

Over at The Daily Kos there’s an article about President Obama and how he conducts his day:

…last month, when Mr. Obama convened Congressional Democratic leaders at the White House for a marathon negotiating session, another priority intervened.

His 11-year-old daughter, Malia, had a band recital.

Thus did the president of the United States ditch his own health care talks — temporarily, at least — to slip off to Sidwell Friends School for a few hours to listen to Malia play the flute. When the recital was over, he returned to the White House, and everybody went back to work.

I think that’s most commendable of him. He refuses to miss things important to his children. Because while to you and me he’s Mr. President, to Malia he’s Dad.

The article continues:

…He knocks off work at 6 p.m. each evening to have dinner with his family, and has given his schedulers strict instructions that, if he must have night-time activities, they are to take place after 8 p.m. That includes matters of war; in November, as the commander in chief wrestled with sending more troops to Afghanistan, he called an 8 p.m. meeting of his national security team, in deference to his role as father in chief.

He has dinner with his family each night, and then no doubt some time to help his children with schoolwork or just read them a bedtime story and tuck them into bed and kiss them goodnight. Good Daddy.

Of course, some people have a problem with this:

“People elect you not to be a good family man, they elect you to fix their problems, and that’s the cold-hearted reality of it,” said John Feehery, a Republican political strategist. “And all those folks on the Hill, they’ve left all their families at home; they don’t have the luxury of skipping back home in the middle of the meeting to catch their daughter’s recital.”…

John Feehery… go fuck yourself. No we didn’t elect him to be a good family man, but for all the talk of how the President should a good role model why are you and others giving him grief for trying to be a good husband and father? Barack Obama is obviously a man unwilling to sacrifice his family, and let me tell you his job is one that could easily destroy his family. He holds his family in high regard and wants to be there for his wife and children. All those folks on the Hill that left their families at home? They have the choice as to where to spend their time, and they’re choosing to not spend it with their family. That’s their problem and their mistake to make. That’s their loss that they’ll never get back.

You see… this hits home for me, very personally. What I’m about to say some people will probably wish I didn’t air so publicly, but it’s the way things were and you can’t escape it. Better to learn and grow from the mistake so as to not repeat it.

My father has been involved in politics the majority of his life and almost the whole of mine. During my growing-up years my father was a member of the US House of Representatives. He was doing a job he wanted and loved. My father was good at it and one of the few politicians I consider a true public servant. Trouble was, the nature of the job coupled with my father’s passion for it left me mostly without a father while I grew up. Much of the year he had to be back in his home district to do work. When he was in town, many days he’d be up and out the door before I woke up and wouldn’t be home until after I had gone to bed. I didn’t get to see my Dad much while growing up. This isn’t to say he didn’t want to spend time with me or the rest of the family. We would make efforts to do things, for example, I’ll never forget those 3 weeks touring Europe when I was 16 years old; but usually they were big things like trips. While those were nice, it’s those little day to day things that end and add up to mattering more.

I recall being in grade school, probably 4th or 5th grade. It was a special week at school because parents were invited to come have lunch with their children at school. Each class or grade rotated as to the day for the parents to come, and my older sister’s day was the day before mine. I was sitting at the lunch table with my friends when my parents came over to the table. Obviously they had just finished having lunch with my older sister and were coming to say hello to me. When my friends caught sight of my Dad they erupted in hails of “Hi Mr. Daub!” “Hey, Mr. Daub!”… just a chorus of my friends acknowledging my Dad. It was such a proud moment for me, to see my friends regarding MY Dad in such esteem. I couldn’t wait for tomorrow when they’d have lunch with me. Earlier that week I had made placemats as part of the class project, and I was all ready to go.

Then tomorrow came. I got my lunch and sat at the table. I put one placemat to my left and one to my right. And I waited for Mom and Dad to arrive. And I waited. And I waited. Other parents were coming in and the chairs were filling up. I remember one Mother asking if the seat next to me was taken. It broke my heart to say “no” and let her take the seat instead of my parent. Lunch ended, and my parents never showed. I was devastated.

Dad was up on The Hill.

It may seem like a small thing, but it’s those little things that add up to a child. Then next thing you know, your child is an adult and living their own life. That whole “cat’s in the cradle and the silver spoon” thing.

I used to hold it against my Dad for the fact he was never around when I was growing up. Of course I no longer do. As an adult with a job and family and responsibilities and so on, I know how it can be and understand. Nevertheless, we are ultimately the ones in control of how we spend our time and lives, and we must realize what is most important to us because time will march on and moments will pass that we’ll never get back. Malia doesn’t really care about health care talks, but she does care that her Dad was there to see and hear her play her flute. To her, that matters more than anything. Mr. Obama knows this, and he’s obviously unwilling to let his daughter down.

My father will never get back the lost time with me as a child. I will never get back the lost time with my father. It’s why when I became a father myself I decided to not repeat my father’s mistake. I swore I’d do all I could for my children, to be there, to teach them, to have experiences with them, and just enjoy life with them. Doesn’t matter if it’s some big fancy trip somewhere or just spending 2 hours at the auto-shop with Oldest waiting to get a flat tire patched up (which we did yesterday). It’s still precious time together. It’s one reason I chose to work from home, because it puts me around my wife and my children all day every day. I don’t get to miss a moment of my wife or kids, and I’m always around for them.

I may be critical of our President in many areas, but here I can only give him praise.

Mr. Obama, you’ve earned some high respect in my book. Even if you fail as a President, I sincerely hope you continue to be a success as a father.

Unpossible

/ hsoi / 28 Comments

So a professor at University of Alabama, Huntsville shoots and kills 3 other professors and wounds 3 others.

But I thought college campuses were gun free zones?

Fat lot of good those signs and policies did.

Furthermore, there were no police nor external security forces there to protect anyone.

Granted, this woman was a case of crazy. But details apparently are that she was in a meeting discussing if she was to get tenure or not, she was denied, pulled out a gun and started shooting. So this was all planned — premeditated. She made up her mind that if she was to be denied tenure, she was going to make people pay with their lives.

You know that saying about shooting fish in a barrel?

She knew they couldn’t fight back. She knew she would have all the advantage.

How might things have been different if the other professors were also armed? Would she have taken a more diplomatic approach to resolving her problem? Could have not have 3 dead and 3 wounded? Of course, it’s all speculation. But the sad reality is things like this happen in gun free zones. From Howard Nemerov:

Ron Borsch is a part-time, commissioned consultant trainer for the Bedford (Ohio) Police Department, with 30 full-time years of service and 17 years with SWAT. He still works part-time, managing the SEALE Police Academy in Bedford, where he specializes in tactically training first-responders, teaching them how to deal with what he calls “active killers.”

Borsch notes that nearly all mass murders occur in places where law-abiding citizens are banned from possessing firearms, either by property owners or government regulation.

The data shows that when law-abiding citizens are allowed the means to protect themselves, violent crime decreases. Everyone likes that end: decrease in violent crime. Trouble is, there are those that don’t like the means to that end. The reality is, it’s the only means that is achieving that end.

If not for arms, where would civil rights be today?

/ hsoi / 5 Comments

A little late in presenting this but given my giant computer snafu I have some time to catch up on my reading while I wait for files to move and copy.

David Kopel writes an informative piece on how the civil rights protesters of the 1960’s may have been non-violent, but they knew people wanted them dead. There was only one way for them to preserve their own lives: to have guns and let it be known they had them.

Later, I worked for years in the Deep South as a full-time civil rights organizer. Like a martyred friend of mine, NAACP staffer Medgar W. Evers, I, too, was on many Klan death lists and I, too, traveled armed: a .38 special Smith and Wesson revolver and a 44/40 Winchester carbine.

The knowledge that I had these weapons and was willing to use them kept enemies at bay. Years later, in a changed Mississippi, this was confirmed by a former prominent leader of the White Knights of the KKK when we had an interesting dinner together at Jackson.

[…]

We were opposed by white racist organizations (e.g., Nazi Party) and various youth gangs of many sorts. My staff and I received countless death threats, there were arson attacks on our offices, and, on one occasion, men with weapons came to my home and told my wife and children that they intended to kill me. (I happened to be at work.)

Again, I was glad I had many firearms and, again, we guarded our home and let this be known. We responded to hate calls on the telephone by telling the callers we were quite prepared for them.

For Salter, the right to own a handgun was apparently a crucial part of his ability to exercise his right to defend himself and his family, which was a sine qua non of his ability to stay alive in order to exercise his First Amendment rights to advocate for enforcement of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Yet in modern Chicago, decent law-abiding citizens are forbidden to own handguns. As I detailed in my amicus brief in McDonald v. Chicago (pages 39–45), many people find that a handgun is best choice for family defense, especially in urban areas such as Chicago. As the history of the Civil Rights Movement demonstrates, the denial of the constitutional right to own a handgun could endanger other constitutional rights, particularly the rights of community organizers.

Read more here.

Texas Gov… decisions… decisions

/ hsoi / 3 Comments

I was listening to KLBJ-FM the other day and the morning jocks were talking about Farouk Shami, Democrat candidate for Texas Governor. They were ripping on him and with pretty good reason. This guy might be popular in Houston but the majority of Texas is not Houston. Could he win the Primary? perhaps, but he’s not going to win the General. He better not.

Bob S. gives analysis as to why.

As for me…

Medina of course seems interesting and I do want to like her, but I fear voting for her will pull votes away from Perry. I may not like Rick Perry but I sure as hell don’t want Hutchison. I always prefer to vote for who I think is the best candidate and I despise voting to game the system. Well, I don’t have to make a decision yet.

Updated: TSRA has released their voter guide for the Texas 2010 Primary Election.

Perry: A+ and the endorsement

KBH: A+

Medina: A

Shami: ? (yes, a question mark)

The crazy thing? If you ignore the ?’s, most people on the list grade decently.

Lifetime CHL?

/ hsoi / 3 Comments

Indiana has an option where you can buy a concealed handgun license that’s good for life. Apparently Oklahoma is considering one as well.

I’m torn on the idea, but the more I think about it the more I like it.

The main thing about any license is that it’s administrative crud to have to deal with; it’s mostly fees and paperwork. Of course, to renew you have to take a class, which over time adds up to a lot of money plus a lot of time spent. How truly necessary is it?

The main advantage to renewals for the license holder is you get to learn about what laws changed since the last time you were in class. This can be a good thing. But we don’t always force people to have to take classes to learn about what laws changed in other aspects of our lives. Is it needed here? To renew your drivers license it’s just forms and fees. Couldn’t we have a lifetime drivers license there too? I could see many people happy about never having to visit the DMV again. 🙂  We’re supposed to be responsible adults, we’re supposed to seek out this information on our own. Ignorance of the law is no excuse and all that. Heck, being in this modern era why couldn’t TX DPS (or whatever entity that oversees the licenses) send an email to all CHL holders when a new law booklet is published?

There are perhaps some subtle issues on the pro and con sides of this issue that I haven’t yet considered. But upon a cursory examination, I could see this being a good thing.

The Fight to Save America

/ hsoi / 3 Comments

Ben Stein writes on the Fight to Save America:

I wonder just how much today’s leaders of this great country realize the exceptionalism of this nation. In the Marxist history departments of today’s universities, they don’t teach that we are exceptional. We are just another racist, money-grubbing country. We are just war mongers and exploiters like everyone else, say these people with their tenure and their hybrid cars.

Nonsense, say I. There is only one America where a man like Barack Obama, out of nowhere, with no family background of connections or power, could come to be president.

There is no other country that takes in the wretched of the earth and in two generations — in one generation — raises them to the ranks of the mighty. If America is murdered by the Muslim terrorists and the environmentalist dictators and the atheists who want to take God out of our lives, there is no other place for freedom to have its citadel. There will be just unending darkness across the earth.

I hope Mr. Obama knows this. I hope Nancy Pelosi knows this. I hope you know this. We are in a fight now to save America, and winning this fight is more important than political correctness or trying to forecast the weather a hundred years from now. We are in a fight to save the America that has given so many of us lives we could not have imagined. We simply cannot lose.