Monday, August 30, 2010

Reading room

As I engage in some long-overdue personal definition and reinvention here, I've been doing less writing and more reading. I've certainly had the time for it.

Last weekend's surfing brought me to two familiar articles (book chapters, actually) addressing the subject of the armed citizen. The first is "
On Sheep, Wolves and Sheepdogs," from On Combat by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, U.S. Army (Ret.). Here's an excerpt:
"Denial kills you twice. It kills you once, at your moment of truth when you are not physically prepared: You didn't bring your gun; you didn't train. Your only defense was wishful thinking. Hope is not a strategy. Denial kills you a second time because even if you do physically survive, you are psychologically shattered by fear, helplessness, horror and shame at your moment of truth."
The other article is "The Constitutional Right and Social Obligation to Carry a Gun," from Living with Glocks by Robert H. Boatman. Not only does the author pull no punches -- he demands that we not flinch:
"Anti-freedom zealots see nothing wrong with leaning on their neighbors to provide them with personal protection even though they would never consider returning the favor. They worship their effeminate fantasy of an all-powerful government with true religious fanaticism. They believe all other humans are as mentally weak, irresponsible, incompetent and self-hating as they know themselves to be. And they encourage only civilization’s most self-destructive tendencies."
I'd be doing KintlaLake Blog readers a disservice if I didn't include this gem in my preview of Boatman's article:
"The framers of the Constitution were under no pressure from the NRA when they wrote, '...the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.'"
In the interest of allowing you to form independent opinions about these articles, I'm presenting them without comment, except to urge you to click on the links and read them -- and think.