POSSE COMATOSE

   I know that in my last posting I stated that I was more than willing to give up all my firearms, save my muzzleloader, if it would make this world a safer place. But even the most glaringly obvious restriction, like not allowing those on a "no-fly" list to purchase guns is not in the cards. So it doesn't seem like any reasonable gun control is coming any time soon. In this paranoid gun-slinger climate our neighbor to the east- the Ulster County Sheriff Paul Van Blarcum, made national news the other night by urging anyone with a carry permit in his county to do so. "The police can't be everywhere." Not to be left out of the mix the Sullivan County Sheriff Michael Schiff publicly agreed that his county permit holders should follow Ulster's lead and do the same. Never one to shirk my civic duty I found my 9mm., scrounged around for a couple of bullets and slid the holster onto my belt. Cheeky looked on in bemused silence. I could tell he didn't think this was a good idea.
   Heeled for the holidays in Sullivan County, I am armed and ready to take on......who? I live in a county that prides itself in arming it's citizenry. Pigpen Rothman applied for a pistol permit a couple of years ago. He told the judge he shot his .38 twice, couldn't hit anything and learned way more in the Israeli Army than the NRA required course. The judge's ears pricked up. He called to his secretary. "Bring in those full carry papers!" After signing and stamping all the copies he shook PP's hand and thanked him "for his service." I guess the word Israeli slipped by him.

   Ben Carson may be deluded enough to think that if he was in Paris or San Bernadino, with his cape and laser shooting eyeballs, he could take on a bunch of heavily armed individuals in body armor and suicide vests, but the average Catskill hillbilly? What the fuck are these guys thinking? Politicians watch too much TV. They think, like in a hollywood movie, an armed individual could slip out their little pocket gun and save the day. It's pure fantasy. Nonetheless moms across two counties are slipping their Lady Smith and Wessons into their pajama bottoms and taking the kids to Walmart, ever vigilant, on the look out for anything suspicious. Can you imagine the bloodshed if that bulge under the shopping Pakistani woman's hijab is a legal .45?
    So the posse is forming. The Catskills are the tip of the spear. Daesh better not lop any heads off in this neck of the woods. Out of a sense of self protection from the rest of the gun toting public, the police and the wacked out politicians I will be strapped at all times until it's safe to put my pistol back on the shelf. It may be a while. God only knows who will protect us from the posse