Fist Fights, Gun Fights, and The Wild West
Being Libertarian means wanting the population to have the freedom to do whatever it wants so long as actions do not harm or interfere with the wants and needs of others. It is as simple as that! Government has insinuated itself into every aspect of life. Do-gooders, and Liberals have taken it upon themselves to control every action and even thought in everyday life to the degree that it takes a law degree to even keep up with it. What seems in the beginning to be a simple law, or regulation ends up being an attack on the very fabric of American life. Let’s take gun control for instance.
The second amendment is very clear. I’m going to paraphrase here. There are two simple statements. One, you need a militia to protect the populace in time of attack. That militia has to be regulated to a military standard. What is a militia? A militia is a military group made up of nonmilitary people who primarily do other things beside play army. This organization is for defending the country from attack. Now this is opposed to an army which is professional people who attack other nations in war to impose the will of your nation on them. It is assumed that the people called up in time of crisis to for this group already have guns, hence we lead directly into the next line of the amendment. Key phrase here: The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. The right of the PEOPLE. The people make up the militia. The people always exist. The militiaexists temporarily in time of crisis. Once the crisis is over the militia goes away. See how simple that is?
Liberals can’t seem to distinguish the difference between people and militia, but then, they can’t distinguish the difference between men and women or babies and puppies either so it all follows true. But, we are asked, if everyone has a gun we will just have the wild west. Well, little imports to Texas, I hate to be the first one to tell you this, but the wild west just wasn’t that wild. Austin, Texas was no wilder than the Five Points in New York. When open carry was the norm bankers and store clerks did not routinely carry a gun. The tellers in the banks wore suits and sat behind cages doing transactions while the bank hired a man with a Winchester to sit in the lobby. Now comes the freedom part, the part where the government doesn’t need to get involved. If a teller decided to bring a hog-leg to work one day he would have the perfect right, except he may be met at the door by the president of the bank and informed that the bank did not want him packing at work. Now, he had the perfect legal right to have his gun on the way to work but the business owner did not want him to bring it into the building because that is why the bank is paying someone to guard the bank!
From here let progress to another issue. Let’s say, just for example, there is a bar in Austin. People frequent said bar and smoke and drink every night of the week. There usually is standing room only. Suddenly the city passes a law saying that no bar can have smoking. (This really happened, folks.) All of the sudden you have clean air and a broke bar. Why? Because people who drink on Friday night usually smoke. In fact, there are special air conditioning units to clean the air and keep everybody’s eyes from watering. Let me explain the Libertarian alterative to this. Why don’t we let the bar owner make bar decisions? What a revolutionary idea! Now, I know, I know, this doesn’t fit the liberal mind set with second hand smoke and yada yada yada. But a bunch of old bikers aren’t worried about second hand smoke! What if, now work with me here, what if the bar owner considers a non-smoking area? And just for the sake of argument, what if a lot of people like the drinks and food and that area begins to have to expand? Then, the owner thinks that maybe, just maybe, he could have the smokers out on a big patio and have the non-smokers inside. Wow! Power to the people! Suddenly, you have a bunch of old bikers on the porch (which is where they want to be anyway) and a flock of yuppies inside (because they think it’s cool to come to this particular bar) and everybody is happy, and you don’t have to have a law regulating the air in a biker bar! As the dynamic changes the owner will know what to do.
Now, back to open carry (work with me here.) Let’s say that open carry was the law of the land. Bikers could roll up on their Harleys with their guns but, it is a house rule that those guns could not come on the bar’s property because common sense tells us that drinking and guns don’t mix! Just like it really was in the proverbial “wild west!” I can hear it now. “Oh, God, Wilbur! Do you know how many shootings there would be with people ignoring the rules and bringing guns anyway?” Do you know how many shootings there are now with the current Texas 51% law? Yeah, there’s a law people. Even if you have a license to carry a gun you can’t carry that gun into an establishment that makes 51% or more of its income from the sale of alcohol, and I just know that everyone strictly adheres to that! Give me a freaking break! I’ve played to too many bars to swallow that one. And for the record, the only friend I’ve ever had who died in a bar’s parking lot was killed by a Bowie knife!
Let the people regulate the people. Good old capitalism usually handles everything and the only people who don’t like that are the losers who can’t make it on their own and need Big Brother to hold them up! Food for thought friends, just food for thought!
Wilbur Witt
Austin Texas
Austin Texas