And speaking of whack jobs, pressure is building for the East Palo Alto, CA, PD to step up and do something about their Detective Roderick Tuason, who posted this statement on a friend's FaceBook page after an Open Carry advocate carried an unloaded AR to a meeting at a local restaurant:
Sounds like you had someone practicing their 2nd amendment rights last night! Should’ve pulled out the AR and prone them all out! And if one of them made a furtive movement… 2 weeks off!!!"Two weeks off" is, of course, cop-speak for killing the person, shooting him or her in the back. FaceBook has pulled down the page, but Kevin Thomason's OAKLANDER blog has the complete exchange. He also has contact information for the PD. As Sebastian has noted in SNOWFLAKES IN HELL:
I have no problem with an officer exercising reasonable care when approaching armed persons, but I’m fairly certain in most other states, officers are trained in how to do this without having to prone and threaten every armed person they come across. In most other states, this would, in fact, rise to the level of a civil rights lawsuit.This kind of comment is indeed inappropriate...let's go back to our discussion yesterday on bigotry and substitute a different group for legal gun owners in that comment: "Sounds like you had someone practicing their right to sit in any seat they want on the bus last night! Should've pulled out the AR and prone them all! And of one of those 'African Americans' made a furtive move...two weeks off!!!" "Sounds like you had someone practicing their right to hold hands with someone of the same sex last night! Should've pulled out the AR and prone them all! And of one of those 'alternative lifestylers' made a furtive move...two weeks off!!!"
20 comments:
How about we exercise our capacity for basic common sense? You may have heard that there have been a few incidents here and there over the past twenty years or so when an individual has de-populated a restaurant using a semi-auto rifle of the quasi-military type. So why put an LEO in the position of having to determine if you're a law-abiding person exercising his constitutional right to both carry an AR into a restaurant and be an idiot, or if you're a lunatic bent on massacre?
With rights come responsibilities. Just because you CAN do it, doesn't mean you SHOULD do it. There is no scenario I can think of where it is sensible to carry a rifle into a restaurant.
Common sense, folks. It's really not that hard.
And equating carrying an AR into a restaurant (legal but f***ing stupid) with sitting in any bus seat you want (which was illegal and f***ing courageous) is just plain wrong.
The "I have a RIGHT" line is one that can really twist up any issue into knots. Sorry to see that it used here. The gay life, the pro death for babies, the NAMBLA crowd, the friends of farm animals, devil worshippers and drug users, don't get equal footing with a clearly stated right to keep and bear arms in my humble view. If I support the 2A I want to make it real clear that I ain't supporting any numbnut that yells IT'S MY RIGHT. Sorry I guess I'm a bigot.
If you want to start equating all the fringe RIGHTS with what is in black and white, then get a Constitutional Convention together and put them explicitly in the document. Otherwise I be sticking with Scalia on narrow and original meaning dude.
Yes, the cat with the AR was being a jackass. However. . .
A guy with an UNLOADED rifle slung across his back is not likely to be planning on doing the kind of public area depopulation that you so apparantly fear.
ESPECIALLY when the owner (who is liekly the guy who called the cops) already knew that the open carry people were coming. At least, EVERY OTHER OC group that has meetings at restaurants I ever heard of calls ahead.
The guy who walks in with a trenchcoat in warm weather, and a rifle with a drum mag attached -- I can see proning him out.
Of course, if you read the actual comments the cop posted, you'd realize he was advocating doing this in circumstances WHERE THE OFFICER ALREADY KNOWS that it's just another OC meeting.
Becuase he has nothing but contempt for armed citizens -- a point he makes bluntly clear in his comments.
The officer was NOT advocating "offcier safety". He was advocating KNOWINGLY intimidating law abiding cictizens for carrying out Constitutional rights, and looking for an EXCUSE to shoot one.
This officer is DANGEROUS. And he makes good cops look bad by association.
He isn't just dangerous. He's the archetype of a rogue officer ... One criminal step above the bully-with-a-badge officer in insanity and PD liability.
He needs to be flipping burgers at a fast food place, and not wearing a badge.
I see no point in carrying an empty rifle to make a statement. Are we as gun owners into the liberal drama of doing just silly things under the guise of raising awareness?
Never was big into theatrics.
As for the officer, he reminds me of the DEA agent who claims he is the only person here who is qualified to carry a Glock right before he shoots himself in the leg. This time the detective shot himself in the ass. Nice job Fife!
Ratcatcher55
"Well, I'm getting out my colander self-defense helmet in anticipation of Iran's "devastating punch" scheduled for Thursday."
No, no, no!
If you want to be the Lord of the Wasteland, you have to strap the colander over your _face_.
We don't know all the circumstances here.......or at least I don't. Many times have I wanted to stop by my local Chili's on the way home from a morning hunt while in my bikini topped Jeep and chosen not to, as it would mean leaving my rifle subject to theft from the vehicle.
BTW.....what the hell does 'prone' mean in this context?
If CA would let me act like a Freeman and CCW maybe I wouldn't be so enthusiastic about OC.
In any case, I'll stand with the founders who saw carrying arms as a normative part of daily life.
Used to be LEO's weren't allowed to carry. But we all know that, right? British Bobby's and all that...
What surprised me recently in reading the NRA 2nd Amendment primer was to learn that if a LEO needed an armed response they were expected to be able to call on assistance of an armed citizen(s) -- expectation was that citizens in public would armed and available to answer the LEO's call.
Dave S., with respect, the whole "sure it's your right but you shouldn't exercise it" doesn't hold any water with me.
With rights come responsibilities...to not exercise those rights? Did I miss something?
If it is a right, then there is nothing in the world wrong with exercising it. If the guy was waving the gun around, etc, that might be something different. But the GUN=BAD mental shortcut that some LEOs want to employ is lazy thinking. And I don't have to give up my rights because you want to be lazy.
How about we file a FOIAA letter requesting each and every time this guy has ever drawn a gun in the line of duty, used force or shot at someone.
Id like to know what sort of cop is walking the streets there..
Another thug with a badge and gun that makes it difficult for regular officers to do their jobs.
Here's hoping that he'll get a two-week vacation WITHOUT pay, as he appears to desperately need one.
Just another example that should remind all gun owners that large police forces are an enemy of a free people.
Question authority, people.
re: Thursday's Punch -- I hope your assessment is correct, and it does SEEM like Iran is still scrounging up enough nuclear material for a weapon.
But just in case, I finished grounding a Faraday cage last night...
King Cavalier:
Your argument is profoundly stupid, and the idea that I'm a coward because I think it's idiotic to carry a rifle in a restaurant is even stupider. So kindly imagine a large, irregularly shaped object and the possibilities of self-insertion.
George:
"With rights come responsibilities...to not exercise those rights? Did I miss something?
"If it is a right, then there is nothing in the world wrong with exercising it."
Fine. I have the right to stand on the public sidewalk in front of your home, holding a camera, every day when your children come home from school. You cool with that?
Dave S.:
And I have a right to hire PIs to go over your background with a fine toothed comb, and to post on the internet videos of you sitting in front of my house at night taking pictures of my kids as a threat display.
Might be hard to get a job with these videos being google-able by any potential employer.
Two way street dude.
It is a two-way street.
So, since we're all mature adults, maybe we could quit trying to run over each other in the middle of it?
There was an example given of a decent reason to carry an unloaded rifle into a suburban (or urban) restaurant. Because of the vehicle he was driving it was the safe, logical thing to do.
Can't we agree that choosing to carry an unloaded rifle, which for responsibilities sake you have to have either slung or in hand for safety and accountability, is kinda stupid without such a logical reason?
Sitting in the front of the bus was noble because it was illegal, so the point had to be made to fix that. However, open carrying any firearm into a restaurant is already legal, what point is being made by carrying a rifle vice a pistol just because?
If the OC goal is to normalize such carry, to show non-gun folks we are "just like them but also carry guns", how in the hell does toting a rifle fulfill that goal? What average non-gun joe will ever think they might carry a rifle around without a sound reason? I'm pretty sure it's a lot easier for them to get behind "yeah, I can see carrying a pistol for defense".
I can't see any sound reason to go to the inconvenience (and if it isn't inconvenient you are doing something fundamentally unsafe)of carrying a rifle that doesn't reduce to "I'm an attention whore" and "I do what I want regardless of looking like a jackass, just because I can".
I find it interesting that "support" OC and the 2A but are adamantly against one putting it in practice don't feel the exact same way about the other BOR ammendments (i.e. 1A, 4A, 5A, etc.)....
The open carry movement is a political movement and if their intent is to re-normalize gun carry/ownership then they need to craft their message with that in mind.
The question is not, "does that guy have a right to carry an AR-15 in a Starbucks?", it is "does it help or hurt the cause"?
So far the open carry movement seems to be pretty successful but baby steps are probably still a good idea.
"Two way street dude."
Um... yeah. That's kind of my entire point.
"The question is not, "does that guy have a right to carry an AR-15 in a Starbucks?", it is "does it help or hurt the cause"?"
Thank you, Steve, for giving me hope that not all of my fellow firearms enthusiasts are yahoos straight out of a Brady Campaign ad.
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