Posts Tagged ‘guns’

Yesterday Texas slipped further back into its wild, wild west fantasies. A flurry of laws went into effect which make the Lone Star State a fascinating and depressing petri dish of individual liberty and systematic repression. The ever-shifting Texan ground is fertile for commentary. Today let’s focus on House Bill 1927.

House Bill 1927, named for the last year when all was right with America dammit, allows most Texans to carry a handgun without first securing a permit. Before you get all indignant, keep in mind the Texas legislature is a reasonable body comprised of rational people making common-sense laws. For example, anyone convicted of a felony or domestic violence will still need that permit. Sensible, right? You should feel ashamed for scoffing at the notion the Texas legislature is anything other than reasonable.

Assuming you are without conviction, you are now free to carry your gun as you please. You can mosey down the street and play cowboy without needing a stupid piece of paper from a stupid bureaucratic hack trying to enforce (more…)

Not so very long ago Americans knew who Charles Whitman was. On August 1, 1966, Charles Whitman shot 46 people from the 27th floor of the University of Texas Tower in Austin. Fifteen died. It shocked the country. The following week the cover of Life magazine was a sobering photograph of the UT Tower through a window with two bullet holes. The shooting was so horrifying and unique that the two major wire news organizations (more…)

The revival of the national gun debate has re-energized failed graphic designers throughout cyberspace. Just when you thought the Presidential election had sapped all their energy these folks have rebounded from November’s muck to grace our monitors and tablets with their amazing PowerPointy/Photoshoppy dexterity! Being nimble of finger and savvy of Google these modern day Rembrandts-cum-Jeffersons have (more…)

It is hard to write through tear stained eyes, but not impossible. What is impossible to comprehend, even fractionally, is the scope of the horror in Newtown, Connecticut yesterday. 26 people mowed down at the hand of a deranged killer, massacred like characters in a video game. 26 people, 20 of them children. Good lord. How does one wrap their head around that? 20 children. It is (more…)