Daily Archives: January 25, 2013
The Original Gun Grabbers are back . . .
and it worked this time about as well as the first time.
The first unofficial battles of the Revolutionary War, The Battles of Lexington & Concord, took place on April 19, 1775 because the British Government wanted to seize our guns, gun powder and other military supplies.
But due to good intelligence on the British plans, the colonials were ready, dispersing the supplies among many towns. And the rides of Paul Revere and William Dawes alerted the countryside so that the colonial militias were ready and waiting. Ironically some of this excellent intelligence is speculated to have come from Margaret Gage, the New Jersey-born wife of General Gage, the military governor of Massachusetts, and commander-in-chief of the troops in the Boston area. I guess you can take the girl out of New Jersey, but you can’t take New Jersey out of the girl.
The series of running skirmishes that made up the battles left the colonials the decisive victors with 49 killed and 39 wounded against British losses of 73 killed and 174 wounded. It also punctured the vaunted superiority of the British Army, and set up the perception that the colonials had a chance to win their independence.
But this time the gun-grabbers came in the form of a British company, Reed Exhibitions, who runs the Eastern Sports and Outdoors Show, one of the largest shows in the US, and held every February in Harrisburg, PA.
But this year, Reed Exhibitions, decreed a couple of weeks ago, that any sales, display, or even mention, of so-called “Assault Weapons” or high capacity magazines was forbidden. They even banned vendors from displaying the logos of companies that made these items.
The boycott started slowly with some vendors dropping out because they had contractual arrangements with some of these manufacturers to sell and display their products.
But this first few were just the small snowball that precedes the avalanche. And an avalanche it was. And it culminated with all the major sponsors, like Cabela’s, Gander Mt., the NRA, etc., dropping out, except for Progressive Ins., all the celebrity performers, and finally the major vendors, like Smith & Wesson, Mossberg, Ruger, and Thompson.
Finally throwing in the towel, a couple of days ago, Reed announced the cancellation of the show, costing them millions, and costing the Harrisburg area an estimated $80 – 100 million to community businesses from the 250,000 visitors that were expected to attend. Reed said when announcing the cancellation that only 170 of the over 1000 vendors had dropped out. If that were true, then why cancel. I’ve seen an online list of the dropouts, and it runs on for pages, a lot more than just a 170.
Sometimes it’s better if you just keep your mouth shut.
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Under the heading of yesterday’s Random Act of Kindness, a 93 year old WWII vet and former Marine Elbert Wood returned from a doctor’s appointment to find his home vandalized and sprayed with red paint by a couple of teenagers.
Houston KTRH talk radio host Michael Berry mentioned the incident on the air and said that someone should help this guy out. In just a few minutes his phone was ringing off the hook.
By 1:30 pm people had dropped off $50,000 in checks made out to Mr. Wood, and he had commitments from a number of companies to completely remodel his house.
Plus the last time I heard the amount of checks was approaching $75,000.
The two teens were caught later that day and a couple of days later, the father of the boys came by to apologize.
Just goes to show you what people can do when they join together.
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Thought for the Day:
Trusting government with power and money is like trusting teenaged boys with whiskey and car keys,
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