Easy Pickin's

Dan Rose opined:

>Historically, robbing someone meant having your hands cut off. Today, in some states you can be killed for commiting certain crimes. None of these punishments deters would-be criminals.

Whoa, there cowboy. How did 'would-be' criminals get into this conversation? The methods above are designed to deal with known criminals... and they are very effective. (Kinda hard to pick a pocket without any hands :-)

> We have to look at what factors promote crime.

We? If you want to get into the philosophical aspects of the problem you'd better begin by defining government, get the mouse out of your pocket or stop using the Royal 'we.'

People create governments to accomplish collectively what cannot be achieved individually. But our government has already told us -- through case law and other means -- that our personal security and safety is an individual responsibility. Collectively, the cops will try to help... if they can... but we can lodge no complaint when they can't. Ditto for the fire department and so on. Public Safety agencies primarily function after the fact for the simple reason that it's impossible for them to prevent you as an individual from sitting your ass on fire. Or sticking a gun in someone's face. Pass all the laws you want, the root problem is that there is no effective means of ensuring they will be obeyed.

Which brings us back to individual responsibility, Good Citizenship and why I wear a gun.


Individually, the best we can do to prevent crime is to raise our kids right and not offer ourselves up as easy targets. But you don't have to be a legal scholar to see that the courts have told us that good citizenship in today's Amerika ultimately requires us to blow away any asshole who tries to do us harm.

The reason for this unpleasant but necessary duty is pretty simple. When a gun is in your face it's obvious you're dealing with a criminal and that whatever deterrents are in place have not worked. When that happens the best the police can offer is a free ride to the morgue. For one of you. Clearly, it is your duty to ensure the other guy goes into the body-bag. Not only does it guarantee they won't do it again, it saves our society an incredible amount of money.

So wear a weapon, hone your skills and be prepared to use them. Because the best possible crime-deterrent is to stop walking around with Easy Pickin's tattooed on your forehead.

-Bob Hoover

PS -- This will come as a Big Surprise to all the bleeding hearts but ninety-nine times out of a hundred you don't even have to pull the trigger. Once they know you are armed and willing to take a hit, they're gone.