Dear Pen Pal: Letters to Vernon

or

How I Gained and Lost a Correspondent

Regular readers know I talked last week about a hoplophobe projectionist from Indiana, State Rep. Vernon G. Smith.

You also know I let him know what I thought about him.

Well, he responded:
I didn't cut his email off--that's how he ended it. Anyway, seeing I had his attention, I thought I'd at least put him in a position where he can't say he doesn't know about the racist implications of U.S. "gun control," borrowing heavily from a prior similar effort.

So here's what I wrote back:

From: David Codrea
Sent: Thursday, January 28, 2010 3:03 PM
To: Vernon Smith
Subject: RE: You

I am kind with those who deserve it. I'm also an American who is sick and tired of petty tyrants messing with my rights and I'm not going to be polite about it with oppressors.

You ought to be ashamed of yourself. Did your oath to the Constitution mean nothing?

We both know that you are not interested in getting rid of all guns. You simply want to be on the side that is armed. And let the ultimate impact on your constituents' unalienable rights be damned.

I wonder what these constituents would say if they were provided the truth about the racist origins and continued discriminatory application of the gun control measures you promulgate? Have you told them about the Slave Codes, that would allow a black man to be whipped (or worse) for possession of any kind of weapon? Or the post-Civil War Black Codes, designed to keep the newly emancipated from obtaining the means of defense during the heyday of Klan terror?

Why don't you circulate the following Louisiana statute among a few of the churches that you get your precinct walkers from, and see what they have to say?

"No negro who is not in the military service shall be allowed to carry fire-arms, or any kind of weapons, within the parish, without the special written permission of his employers, approved and endorsed by the nearest and most convenient chief of patrol."

If that doesn't make an impression, why not try the following offering from Mississippi?

"No freedman, free Negro, or mulatto not in the military service of the United States government, and not licensed so to do by the board of police of his or her county, shall keep or carry firearms of any kind..."

Oh, hell, let's cut to the chase and clue them in to Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. (19 How.) 393 (1857):

"Protection of the ‘absolute rights of individuals' to personal security, liberty, and private property is secured in part by ‘the right of bearing arms'--which with us is...practically enjoyed by every citizen, and is among his most valuable privileges, since it furnishes the means of resisting as a freeman ought, the inroads of usurpation."

Tell them how racist Supreme Court Chief Justice Taney concluded that blacks, as legal scholar and civil rights attorney Professor Don B. Kates has recorded, "could not be ‘citizens,' because if they were, they would have the right to vote, to assemble, to speak on political subjects, to travel freely, and ‘to keep and carry arms wherever they went.'"

Now tell them how the government has neither the legal obligation nor the capability to protect them, and how your police will not arrive in most life-and-death situations in time to do anything but tape off the crime scene, cover the body and take a report. Then make sure you tell them that you don't credit them with having the judgment or maturity to be entrusted with the means of personal defense, in spite of landmark peer-reviewed studies from Florida State University and the University of Chicago that conclusively demonstrate the crime-deterring, life- saving value of guns in private, law-abiding hands.

I suspect you won't tell them any of this. And, because of the unique privileges and stature that you enjoy in your position, this is especially contemptible.

To have risen to such a prestigious and powerful position speaks of many positive and remarkable characteristics that you must be blessed with. But a true leader would use his authority to preserve, protect and champion the freedoms of those he serves. How sad, how telling, and how ultimately treasonous that you have chosen to misapply yours for your own gain.

And rather than being a leader in liberty, you have opted to become just another one of the plantation's overseers.

Foolish man.

David Codrea
_____________________________
The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance
Gun Rights Examiner
Guns Magazine "Rights Watch"
CUM ULLA SELLA IN PUGNO TABERNA

And he responded:
Talk about a substantive rebuttal.

So I gave it the consideration and deliberation his thoughtful response merited:
Prompting another brilliant parry:
And that is the sound of a mind, such as it is, slamming shut.

That doesn't surprise me--after all, we're dealing with a politician who is both a "progressive" and an academic.

And while you'll never see this, Vernon (yeah, right), you should know I agree with your conclusion--just not with your rationale for it.

I have no reason for sharing this with WOG readers other than to let you know it is possible to get these creatures' attention and then to get under their skin. Since they're the ones initiating attacks on our rights, just knowing that can make the effort worthwhile.

And thus ends a beautiful friendship, before it ever had the chance to flower.

Too bad. But I do hope Vernon finds another pen pal.