Why is it when an OC'er gets a rough ride from LEO's, there is a multitude of gunners that jump into the fray with statements that are disparaging to the OC'er, that somehow the LEO's not knowing the law or attempting to enforce "their version or interpretation" of the law is the OC'er fault?
There was one statement to the fact that events like this is why one member here would not OC…proof that government intimidation works…..afraid to exercise a right because you are afraid to be hassled.
This is not the OC’er fault. That the LEO’s do not know the law or overstep the law is not the OC’ers responsibility. If this OC’er knows the laws, carries a copy of the laws and records the encounter…good on ya brother. It is obvious that a number of people here have no idea what their rights are, and more to the point, only cares to what applies to their particular carry or shooting habits. It is important to know what the LEO’s may and may not do, and assert your rights, if you do not assert your rights, by failure to assert, it can be construed that you consented to forfeit your rights.. The police DO NOT have the right to detain simply for open carry, where OC is legal. The LEO’s overstepped their Constitutional and legal boundaries here, and the OC’er is blamed by gun owners.
Do we really want to defend LEO’s that trampled freedom fighters constitutional right to carry?
What in the hell I’m I missing here, where is the support for the 2nd amendment rights of the OP that was OC’ing. Have we become politically correct sheep that the legal open carry of a pistol or revolver is cause for piling on the OC’er? Do you truly believe that carry of arms is only the purview of CCW holders or only in deer camp?
What will be the response when one day CC is not condoned by so call politically correct “responsible gunners”? Will we see people jumping in and accusing the CC holder of entrapment, baiting the LEO’s or accusations of just being plain irresponsible for CC’ing? How about when they revoke your CCW, who will be standing behind you?
Either assert your rights or we will lose them, this gentlemen had his 2nd and 4th amendment rights violated and all some can do is dump him. In my mind he is asserting OUR rights.
This reminds me of “The Hangman” I hope all will forgive me for posting it, but it seems very appropriate in this case. I would ask that each time the Hangman refers to an ethnic group think of a gun right or particular firearm that the government wants to outlaw.
The Hangman
by Maurice Ogden
Stanza 1
Into our town the Hangman came, smelling of gold and blood and flame. And he paced our bricks with a diffident air. And built his frame on the courthouse square.
The scaffold stood by the courthouse side, only as wide as the door was wide; a frame as tall, or little more, than the capping sill of the courthouse door.
And we wondered, whenever we had the time, who the criminal, what the crime, that Hangman judged with the yellow twist of knotted hemp in his busy fist.
And innocent though we were, with dread we passed those eyes of buckshot lead; till one cried: "Hangman, who is he for whom you raise the gallows-tree."
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye, and he gave us a riddle instead of reply: "He who serves me best," said he, "Shall earn the rope on the gallows-tree."
And he stepped down, and laid his hand on a man who came from another land and we breathed again, for another's grief at the Hangman's hand was our relief.
And the gallows-frame on the courthouse lawn by tomorrow's sun would be struck and gone. So we gave him way, and no one spoke, out of respect for his hangman's cloak.
Stanza 2
The next day's sun looked mildly down on roof and street in our quiet town and, stark and black in the morning air, the gallows-tree on the courthouse square.
And the Hangman stood at his usual stand with the yellow hemp in his busy hand; with his buckshot eye and his jaw like a pike and his air so knowing and businesslike.
And we cried: "Hangman, have you not done, yesterday, with the alien one?" Then we fell silent, and stood amazed: "Oh, not for him was the gallows raised."
He laughed a laugh as he looked at us: "Did you think I'd gone to all this fuss to hang one man? That's a thing I do to stretch the rope when the rope is new."
Then one cried, "Murderer!" One cried, "Shame!" And into our midst the Hangman came to that man's place. "Do you hold," said he, "With him that was meant for the gallows-tree?"
And he laid his hand on that one's arm, and we shrank back in quick alarm, and we gave him way, and no one spoke out of fear of his hangman's cloak.
That night we saw with dread surprise the Hangman's scaffold had grown in size. Fed by the blood beneath the chute the gallows-tree had taken root;
Now as wide, or a little more, than the steps that led to the courthouse door, as tall as the writing, or nearly as tall, halfway up on the courthouse wall.
Stanza 3
The third he took — we had all heard tell — was a usurer and infidel, And: "What," said the Hangman, "have you to do with the gallows-bound, and he a Jew?"
And we cried out: "Is this one he who has served you well and faithfully?" The Hangman smiled: "It's a clever scheme to try the strength of the gallows-beam."
The fourth man's dark, accusing song had scratched out comfort hard and long; and "What concern," he gave us back, "Have you for the doomed - the doomed and black?"
The fifth.The sixth. And we cried again: "Hangman, Hangman, is this the man?" "It's a trick," he said, "that we hangmen know for easing the trap when the trap springs slow."
And so we ceased, and asked no more, as the Hangman tallied his bloody score; and sun by sun, and night by night, the gallows grew to monstrous height.
The wings of the scaffold opened wide till they covered the square from side to side; and the monster cross-beam, looking down, cast its shadow across the town.
Stanza 4
Then through the town the Hangman came and called in the empty streets my name - and I looked at the gallows soaring tall and thought: "There is no one left at all for hanging, and so he calls to me to help pull down the gallows-tree." And I went out with right good hope to the Hangman's tree and the Hangman's rope.
He smiled at me as I came down to the courthouse square through the silent town, and supple and stretched in his busy hand was the yellow twist of the hempen strand.
And he whistled his tune as he tried the trap and it sprang down with a ready snap— and then with a smile of awful command he laid his hand upon my hand.
"You tricked me, Hangman!" I shouted then. "That your scaffold was built for other men. And I no henchman of yours," I cried, "You lied to me, Hangman, foully lied!"
Then a twinkle grew in his buckshot eye: "Lied to you? Tricked you?" he said, "Not I. For I answered straight and I told you true: The scaffold was raised for none but you.
"For who has served me more faithfully than you with your coward's hope?" said he, "And where are the others that might have stood side by your side in the common good?"
"Dead," I whispered; and amiably "Murdered," the Hangman corrected me; "First the alien, then the Jew... I did no more than you let me do."
Beneath the beam that blocked the sky, none had stood so alone as I - and the Hangman strapped me, and no voice there cried "Stay" for me in the empty square.
Make no mistake, for gun owners, we all need to support each other and all of our 2nd amendment rights, or in the case of The Hangman, one day we will be standing with only single shot .22’s and they will come for them. Wake up people; we cannot only support the 2nd as it applies to our own guns or thoughts. That we all stick together and support OC where legal is mandatory in my book.
To freedom fighter 777 ,“Carry On” amigo, come on out to Utah one of these days, or better yet Arizona I'll open carry with you.
Steve
