Hunters need to separate themselves from gun nuts

"About the time that Daddy left to fight the big war/I saw my first pistol in the general store/In the general store, when I was thirteen/Thought it was the finest thing I ever had seen/So I asked if I could have one someday when I grew up/Mama dropped a dozen eggs, she really blew up/She really blew up and I didn't understand/Mama said the pistol is the Devil's right hand.''

When I was 13, Dad gave me the family .22 rifle as my most cherished Christmas gift. When I turned 18, my 12-gauge shotgun and my deer rifle were my first important life purchases.

The only thing I asked Dad to bequeath me in his will is an ancient, open-bore, single-shot, 12-gauge shotgun my Grandpa Bowman gave him as his first gun as a boy.

So I watch with more than passing interest when an anti-gun person such as Mayor Daley steps into the political arena with gun legislation.

As hunters, we must learn to separate ourselves from the gun nuts, those who would oppose every firearm restriction. Otherwise, we'll be lumped in the crackpot pile.

*A ban on military-style, semi-automatic assault weapons. I absolutely agree. It should have been done years ago. The problem for hunters is the definition of assault rifles; otherwise, it in no way affects my right to own a shotgun or rifle for hunting.

*Restrict handgun purchases to one per person per month. For my money, you could ban handguns completely. That in no way affects my right to own a shotgun or rifle for hunting.

*Gun fingerprinting. I have no problem with that other than it is another governmental intrusion into our lives. It in no way affects my right to own a shotgun or rifle for hunting.

*Lengthening the waiting period for taking possession of a handgun from three days to 10. Hey, make it a month, a year, 10 years. It in no way affects my right to own a shotgun or rifle for hunting.

*Require annual background checks of those who hold Firearm Owners Identification Cards. I think that will be a logistical nightmare and should not be enacted for that reason. Otherwise, check all you want. It in no way affects my right to own a shotgun or rifle for hunting.

*Increase the cost of a FOID card. It annoys me. It will cost me. But it in no way affects my right to own a shotgun or rifle for hunting.

*Mandate background checks of people who buy firearms at gun shows. Absolutely. That should have been in place years ago. That in no way affects my right to own a shotgun or rifle for hunting.

*State licensing of gun dealers and a state database of gun information. Go ahead. I think it will be a logistical nightmare; otherwise, it in no way affects my right to own a shotgun or rifle for hunting.

*Increased penalty for secret compartments in vehicles for weapons. Throw the book at them. That in no way affects my right to own a shotgun or rifle for hunting.

Daley's proposals make sense. But then, I am a hunter who owns guns, not a gun nut. Guns don't mean more than life to me.

"Bowman's Outdoor Line'' is heard on "Outdoors with Mike Norris'' (3-4 p.m. Thursdays, 1280-AM).

It is said that a mouse peeked through a crack in the wall, and saw a farmer and his wife opening a package. He thought to himself, “What food might it contain?” He was aghast, when he observed that it was a mouse trap instead!

Running to the farmyard, the mouse proclaimed the warning, "There is a mouse trap in the house, there is a mouse trap in the house."

The chicken clucked and scratched, raised her head and said, "Mr. Mouse, I can tell you this is a grave concern to you, but it is of no consequence to me; I cannot be bothered by it."

The mouse turned to the pig and told him, "There is a mouse trap in the house."

"I am so very sorry Mr. Mouse," sympathized the pig, "but there is nothing I can do about it but pray; be assured that you are in my prayers."

The mouse turned to the cow, who replied, "Like wow, Mr. Mouse, a mouse trap; am I in grave danger, Duh?"

So the mouse returned to the house, head down and dejected to face the farmer's mouse trap alone.

That very night a sound was heard throughout the house, like the sound of a mouse trap, catching its prey. The farmer's wife rushed to see what was caught, and in the darkness, she didn't see that it was a venomous snake, with it’s tail caught in the trap. The snake bit the farmer's wife, whereupon the farmer rushed her to the hospital.

She was released in a short time, however she returned home with a fever. Now everyone knows you treat a fever with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer took his hatchet to the farmyard, to obtain the soup's main ingredient.

His wife's sickness continued, so friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock. In order to feed them, the farmer butchered the pig.

The farmer's wife did not get well, in fact, she died, and so many people came for her funeral, the farmer had the cow slaughtered, to provide meat for all of them to eat.

My friend, the next time you hear that someone is facing a problem, and think that it does not concern you, remember the chicken, pig and cow; when someone else is threatened, so are you!

Be careful, don’t overlook the truth of this Daily Meditation, because of the lightheartedness of the story.

That was a little country wisdom someone recently shared with Rev4u@BellSouth.net who shared with his readers.

Just thought I'd pass it along.

This is my email to him:

Gun Nuts need to separate themselves from Hunters February 17, 2003

"The right to buy weapons is the right to be free." -Vincent Van Gogt

I don't hunt. It's the most inhumane thing to do in the outdoors, after all, when I make time to spend in the shrinking outdoors, with subdivisions encroaching, I want to see natures critters in their native habitat, I like to hear the birds singing and not the sounds of some hunter indiscriminately blasting away especially if I'm on the other side of where he's blasting.

I don't hunt, I own guns.

They are my most valued possessions.

When I was 8, Dad gave me a model 25 Daisy BB gun, it had been passed down two generations, it has gold inlay & a 1925 patent date. When I turned 13, my dad bought my .22 Savage semi-automatic rifle. I loved to rip a full tube magazine of 15 shots as fast as I could pull the trigger. At 15, my Remington 1100 became my next favorite gun; I took up reloading shot shells, hunting dove & quail. I bought a .50 caliber black powder rifle for deer and killed my first at 18. At 21, I bought my first handgun, a Colt Series 70 Gold Cup.

I got a pet bird at 18, a cockatiel who is still with me today some 20 years later. I haven't hunted a bird since. Nor have I hunted deer since the first & last one that I killed in 1983. In fact, I don't anything hunt anymore but I love to shoot. In fact, I fire over a thousand rounds of ammo every month. I guess my ammo inventory in my garage would qualify as an arsenal.

Guns are special to me, like a Boon & Crocket trophy deer to a hunter. Being mechanically inclined, I have a great appreciation for the design of the action, in the exact same manner that someone appreciates a fine watch or a classic car.

So I watch with intent interest when any anti-gun person makes a statement in regards to gun legislation, including anti-gun hunters.

As a law abiding gun owner and human being, I disagree with all gun legislation.

As gun nuts, we must learn to separate ourselves from the hunters, those who would welcome every firearm restriction. Otherwise, we'll be lumped in the "savage" pile, PETA is right. Who needs to hunt today, all you could want is at the grocery store. I read stories about illegal poaching by hunters, hunting accidents, hunters shot by other hunters, cars shot by hunters , don’t get me started on the road signs shot up by hunters. I rarely read about assault rifle & handgun accidents at gun ranges. I read EVERY DAY how someone armed with a handgun saved a life or stopped a criminal in his tracks.

*A ban on military-style, semi-automatic assault weapons. I vehemently disagree. No restrictions whatsoever should be placed on these weapons. If our soldiers can be trusted with M16's or M60 machine guns in Iraq, Korea, Vietnam, they have the right to own and possess these weapons at home they lay down their lives for this very freedom every day. Besides who would use an assault rifle for hunting? The only place is see or use my assault rifle is at the two target ranges that I pay annual membership to belong to. I use my AR15, Russian SKS, AK-47 and "gasp" 50 caliber BMG rifle (man, I love my 50 BMG!)to compete in tactical matches. Once in a while I'll bring out the Browning 1919A7 belt fed for nostalgia’s sake. The only thing we "kill" is paper targets, not defenseless animals that are losing their habitat.

*Restrict handgun purchases to one gun per person per month. Never, when I have spare cash, I buy a new handgun. They are like coins and stamps to me. I want one of every caliber and variation made. I hope to have a complete collection of everything that Glock makes. But I do I think they should restrict hunting ammunition to 10 rounds per person per month. That would keep these moron hunters from indiscriminately blasting away. After all, I hunted with a muzzle loading rifle and all I had was one shot and because I was careful, one shot was all I needed. Hunters just "spray and pray", they blast away at helpless little animals with as many rounds as they have to make up for their lack of hunting skill. If I had my way, all hunting would be done with spears and bows. It was all the Native Americans needed.

*Gun fingerprinting. I have a serious problem with that. It is an immense waste of taxpayer funds. It in no way will help solve crimes, there are millions & millions of guns out there that will never be "finger printed", and as the Justice Department reported, over %80 of all gun crimes are committed with stolen weapons or guns obtained from friends or relatives. If such legislation is enacted, then it will be necessary to serialize shotgun shells & require some kind of paper trail to the ammunition, since the "shot" cannot be finger printed like a bullet can and, in fact, it is nearly impossible to trace or link a shotgun to a shooting death. It in no way affects my right to shoot my assault rifle at the target range since they are all pre-ban.

*Lengthening the waiting period for taking possession of a handgun from three days to 10. That’s fine; I am unaffected since, in Florida, my concealed carry license exempts me from any waiting period, one of the perks in having a FBI background check. I think they should also make the waiting period for purchasing any kind of hunting rifle or shotgun dependant on the hunter demonstrating that he can accurately hit his target under timed pressure. When he can demonstrate that he can humanely kill a poor animal with proper shot placement, then he can complete the purchase of his hunting rifle or shotgun. After all, animals killed by hunters are often never found due to poor shot placement or left to rot in the woods after being harvested only as a trophy. It in no way affects my right to shoot my assault rifle at the target range.

*Require annual background checks of those who hold Firearm Owners Identification Cards. If they do require annual checks, they should also test for drugs and alcohol. Especially during hunting season. A large number hunters that I know spend as much time boozing as they do hunting. Check all you want. It in no way affects my right to shoot my assault rifle at the range there is a zero tolerance for drugs and alcohol.

*Increase the cost of a FOID card. They should increase the cost of hunting licenses as well to pay for habitat reconstruction and litter pickup. Nothing pains my eyes more than to see the beer cans, Vienna sausage cans, and the survey ribbon strewed about the woods where I like to enjoy nature’s peace & solitude. I see trees shot to pieces by bored hunters, shotgun shell casings everywhere and the ground all rutted up by their 4 wheel drive trucks and their 4 wheelers. The dog hunters are even worse. Dogs run off every kind of creature, I’ve seen angry hunters shot their hunting dogs for not obeying a command and every year I see abandoned hunting dogs along the roadside. The increased fees would no way affects my right to shoot my assault rifle since we have trash cans and people are required to pick up their brass at the gun range.

*Mandate background checks of people who buy firearms at gun shows. With my CCW permit, I paid for my right to buy my guns unharrassed. Hunters should have to go through a background check every time they buy guns or ammo no matter where they buy from to check for DUI violations and hunting violations. It in no way affects my right to shoot my assault rifle at the gun range.

*State licensing of gun dealers and a state database of gun information. Gun dealers are already licensed, fingerprinted and photographed by the Federal Government; BATF makes regular records inspections at dealer’s places of business as well. Perhaps a higher hunting license fee to pay for the states costs in maintaining this database since hunters have the most right to possess firearms. It will in no way affect my right to shoot my assault rifle at the gun range since I don't need a hunting license to shoot paper.

*Increased penalty for secret compartments in vehicles for weapons. When my handgun is stolen from my vehicle, I want State subsidized insurance that pays %100 for replacing my stolen gun. I also want a state release from liability for what that gun is used for after being stolen. But I seriously doubt criminals would have an interest in an encased hunting rifle or shotgun laid openly on the seat or small pistol case for that matter, you can't tell what's in a gun case right?. It in no way affects my right to shoot my assault rifle at the gun range since I use something other than a gun case for transport my rifle in and I disguise it well and my handgun is always on my person.

Daley's proposals make no sense, just like any other anti-gun proposal. Murder is illegal, domestic abuse is illegal, robbery is illegal but no piece of paper or law book has ever stopped a crime much less a bullet But handguns have and do so everyday. If "assault rifles" were such a problem, we'd hear about it everyday but, in fact, criminals are the problem and legislators do nothing but turn them back out on the street. By keeping crime high, legislators secure & justify their own jobs. According to a world report by UNICEF, the number one killer of children in developed nations is automobiles. And there are far too many of them on the road, and they damage the environment. Why don't we ban them and only allow police and military to operate motor vehicles.

I am a gun nut who doesn’t hunt. Guns mean more than life to me.

(It is with sarcasm that I criticize hunters, I do believe in hunting, I wanted to make a point about the stereotypes imposed on all gun owners, hunters included, so don't flame me over this, I support hunting and I am studying to become a hunter education instructor in Florida)

My letter to the author:

Do you think they'll stop banning guns when they've banned everything except your ancient open-bore 12-gague shotgun? I'd lay odds that they will do the same thing they've done with .50 caliber rifles - "that gun is tooooo biiiiig," and they'll ban everything except 20-gague single-shots with birdshot.

About 25 years ago, they weren't particularly shy about saying this. An accquaintance wrote this about a speech by Josh Sugarman that he covered as a journalist, back in the days when the name of Handgun Control Inc. was The National Coalition to Ban Handguns:

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"First, we ban cheap handguns, because everybody is afraid of street crime.

"Next, we ban military-type automatic rifles, because nobody needs a machine gun for hunting.

"Then, since nobody can buy cheap handguns, they won't want to move up to more expensive handguns, so we can ban ALL handguns except for those used by military and police. And we make the soldiers and cops turn theirs in to an armory when they go off duty." (You must remember, this guy and this audience hated American soldiers and policemen almost as much as they hated the NRA.)

"Then, because a true sportsman only needs one shot, we ban everything except single-shot rifles and shotguns.

"And if we do this, then in about five years, all the deer hunters and duck hunters will get fed up and quit, and there will be so few gun owners left that we can go ahead and finish the job, and ban all privately owned guns in America!"
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Your attitude that the gun rights debate is solely about your "right to hunt" (as if that appears anywhere in the Constitution) and your repetition of the mantra, "in no way affects my right," is chillingly remeniscent of the poem by Pastor Martin Niemoller, written during WW-II:

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First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.
-----

Other people have rights besides you and your fellow hunters, including the most fundamental of all rights, the right to self-defense against violent attackers that you would see stripped away with a handgun ban. Washington DC already did that, and its crime rate leads the nation, while the 33 states that have passed right-to-carry laws have seen their crime rates fall.

Consider the content of http://www.a-human-right.com/

You are woefully uninformed about the central issues in the gun control debate, and I urge you to educate yourself before you again attempt to address them in print. And I also urge you to abandon the term "gun nut" - because in the eyes of pacifist vegetarians, you too are a "gun nut." That term is full of hate and denigration, just like "nigger" and "kike," and warrants no place in the vocabulary of anyone who owns a firearm.

-Michael Pelletier.

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