Arizonans are now allowed to carry concealed weapons into bars. Gov. Jan Brewer signed the law on Monday to guarantee the right to be fully loaded in bars.
The law would still bar drinking while carrying a weapon and would allow restaurants and bars to prohibit the practice if they properly post warnings. Some may not be content with just being armed without their flaming shot or Schnapps shooter. Forty states have such laws.
Bar owners are not thrilled. Mike Nelson, owners of Pomeroy’s bar in Phoenix, said “This might be one of the stupidest things that I have heard of.”
Gun owners recently celebrated the right to bear arms in churches and work places in Texas and Arkansas (here).
For the story, click here.
“It ticks me off when one, whose people aren’t good at protecting others, looks down upon those who will.”
Jim Byrne,
This is annoying and I’ll tell you why. While you already know that I agree with you on the 2nd Amendment , you also know I don’t have a gun. This is not because I’m not able to shoot handguns or rifles and truth be told I’m a better than average shot. I don’t have a gun around the house, there are no young children, because for it to be effective it would have to be loaded and handy, like in my night table. There are times either my wife or I are up during the night and awake the other coming into the bedroom or bed. Waking up out of a sleep at 3:00am leaves me groggy and my home is dark, I don’t like the possibilities entailed. This is not to say that there are no defensive measures prepared, because there are, I’m a wise old bird who spent many years walking alone on the meanest streets in NYC, day and night. Part of what’s kept me from danger is that I’ve devised scenarios for dealing with all manner of possible attack including the possibility of home invasion.
Now where your point gets annoying to me is your assumption that only those carrying handguns, aren’t good at protecting others. Well Jim I’m damned good at protecting others and have actually saved lives in the process. I’m not a hero, but I think you might see I’ve got a strong sense of duty to my fellow humans. Sometimes people carrying guns get too relaxed in their environments because of their assumed protection. I prefer to be alert to my environment at all times, whereas some with firepower may tend to relax their guard. Now you being ex-military may understand that failure to be alert at any time is where the real danger comes from. Many, who carry without your skill set or my street smarts can just as easily fall victim even if they are packing some heavy artillery.
It’s interesting that the presumed weapons of assasins are low caliber.
GLSM,
So to sum it up, you don’t need to research what you’re saying because you KNOW you’re right? If you want to have a rational discussion on a topic, it’s best to base your reasoning on evidence not faith. If you want to give a great sermon, well then faith is the way to go. Personally I’ve been preached to enough in my life, so you’ll forgive me if I walk out of this big tent revival.
Not every gun owner wants a grenade launcher, and not every gun control advocate wants guns banned. We’ll be much closer to finding a happy middle ground when both sides realize that.
Jim Byrne writes: From your comments, I think it would be reasonable to assume that you haven’t spent much time around guns, or gun owners.
I am a great shot. I used to have a 22. I gave it up after Bobby Kennedy was assassinated. I just did not see any reason to fire a gun again. I’ve lived in more than a few places where average people had guns and hunted and did target stuff. I know people who keep guns in their homes. There isn’t anything wrong with the people — its the guns that I don’t care for.
You: Your prejudice is showing. Are you the same person that said you would move your family out of the country if the draft was instituted? –If you won’t defend your neighborhood, your city, your state, or even your country (because “your people aren’t good at that”) be aware that others will have to do it for you. –Those “taller, better looking, better in bed” gun owners will defend you, should the need arise. You won’t be happy that they even exist..until you need them.
me: yes my bias is showing. and I am the same person who wrote that I would move my family out of the country if the draft is reinstated. first you have to believe that a war is worth something to you and I don’t believe that the war we are fighting now has any value to me. I believe that this was was manufactured and is criminal. and my kids are not soldiers. I did not raise them to put on uniforms and go into the desert or the jungle or to be electrocuted from faulty wiring in barracks showers. I never believed in war. I still don’t.
I don’t have to send my kids to be fire fighters or police officers either and this isn’t because I don’t think that their work isn’t valuable. it’s just inconsistent with my kids and their temperament. maybe you see a moral imperative to sending your kids off to die. I don’t.
Gyges writes: Your bias is showing. I agree that booze and guns don’t mix (as does IS and just about ever gun owner I know). Your characterization of gun owners as drunk hicks is insulting and just plain wrong. Let’s look at the gun owners in my immediate social circle…
whoa. steady there. of course my bias is showing. I meant it to show. This isn’t something to be embarrassed about… it isn’t my slip showing. I don’t get why anyone needs a gun. I just don’t. On my side of the argument is the huge number of gun-related violence that could and should be avoided if it were not so easy for ordinary people to have guns. it isn’t a sign of advanced society or greatness that causes gun-related violence, but easy access to guns.
when I see a hand gun, I see a future dead person. I see a corpse attached to it. thats what guns are for. to kill and maim and threaten. yeah I know people like to shoot targets and clay thingies and animals. and if they did not do that, they;d find something else equally interesting and compelling to do. just like people do in lots of other countries that we consider enlightened where people don’t own guns and don’t miss them.
I believe that you and many others who are educated and responsible may be gun owners. the problem isn’t that some are responsible the problem is that many are not. that loaded guns are kept in drawers next to beds and children find them and discharge them and kill each other. and that guns obtained easily and illegally are used by kids in schools and disgruntled employees. and that many of these weapons are semi-automatic and automatic. can we at least agree that the average citizen does not need a grenade-launcher?
I have a ladder in my garage that has about 20 different warning labels. Do guns have them? how about bullets?
You: Let’s not be lazy in our thinking. You think that allowing concealed guns in bars is going to lead to more violence, fine. You could try and prove it, as has been pointed out there are plenty of places that have this law, go get statistics. What doesn’t do anyone a bit of good is dismissing those that disagree with you as some group that’s some how lesser than you. (By the way, I’ve actually given this general speech to people arguing the other side as well).
me: This will prove itself. I don’t have to go out of my way to prove anything. What I do know is that for every instance where a gun is used in a senseless crime there are people just like you and I who can’t wrap out heads around it.
It’s that the math is too easy. more guns does equal more gun violence. at least we agree that you can’t carry a gun into a school or a courthouse or on an airplane but if it is legal to carry in church or a bar why isn’t is legal to carry in a courthouse or school …and btw, just because these are gun-free zones does not mean they are gun-free.
You: Your flippant and dismissive attitude becomes you as little as it became Domino.
me: okay. so you don’t like my tone. sometimes that is going to happen. one thing you can count on is this: I won’t get cheesed-off and take a gun and shoot someone because they are critical of my writing style. we all get to have our opinions about stuff like that. but if you want to put me in the same basket as Domino, fine.
Its hot today. really really hot. and that makes me less charitable and sometimes my stab at humor misses. better to miss the joke than the target, eh?
you: To answer your question: My gun feeds me and my family, and provides me with an enjoyable hobby (target shooting) that helps me stay relaxed and is a valuable exercise in maintaining focus, fine motor skills, and visualization.
me: ok then. if you ate something that you killed everyday and had to to survive, it would be another topic. tell me that you don’t have a grocery store with fresh T-bones wrapped in plastic and I’ll lay off.
Gyges,
Yes; It was somewhat unrelated. GLWSM’s attitude toward gun owners, combined with her previous statements that she would leave the country if the draft was initiated (because her people just aren’t good at that) got to me.
Are “my people” better suited to give their lives for this country than “her people”?
Our military, like those who chose to carry concealed, are intended to be defensive weapons. A concealed weapon is rarely used to defend oneself. That puts the carrier in harms way for the protection of others. It ticks me off when one, whose people aren’t good at protecting others, looks down upon those who will.
Jim,
Don’t have my regs handy, but I was thinking specifically of archery and muzzle loading seasons.
O.k. so then you admit what you said to GLSM about the draft had nothing to do with the conversation?
JW,
O.k. your turn. If concealed weapons make a society safer, prove it. (Anecdotes and hypotheticals don’t count as proof). I would ask that you avoid the studies on DGU (Defensive Gun Use), there’s no clear consensus and the studies most cited by both sides of the issue are flawed. http://www.saf.org/LawReviews/SmithT1.htm
I’d suggest you look for something that compares violent crime rates in areas with concealed carry permits to analogous areas without.
Gyges,
I don’t think I would deer hunt without a pistol. I wasn’t aware of any state that had a law against “finishing off” a deer that had already been shot legally. -Even if the initial shot was with a bow.
“There is no correlation between the right to defend oneself and a forced servitude to the U.S. Gov’t. I would even go so far as to say that the Second Amendment is in place to help the individual protect themselves against Government actions like the draft.”
I agree. There is no correlation between the right to defend oneself and forced servitude. However, I do think there is a correlation between the Second Amendment and the ability to defend against one’s government. Perhaps Federalist #28 will provide support for my contention.
“If the representatives of the people betray their constituents, there is then no resource left but in the exertion of that original right of self-defense which is paramount to all positive forms of government, and which against the usurpations of the national rulers, may be exerted with infinitely better prospect of success than against those of the rulers of an individual state…The citizens must rush tumultuously to arms, without concert, without system, without resource; except in their courage and despair. The usurpers, clothed with the forms of legal authority, can too often crush the opposition in embryo.”
GWLSM: okay then. so, let me ask you this…. do bars ask to see your concealed weapon before they serve you? the gun is concealed. the bartender can’t see it. asking if the customer has a weapon and asking to see it may be an illegal search.
You’re not thinking this through. They don’t ask to see *if* you have a weapon as things stand now. If you were a criminal, you could carry in an Arizona bar when it was illegal because you can carry anywhere; you’re a criminal. Putting the sign up will put things back to where they were before. Criminals will continue carrying as much as they were before, permit holders, the ones who commit far less crime than non-permit holders, will not.
JW: In any measurable sense, it has not been a problem.
GWLSM: really.
Yes, really. Both Florida and Texas have published data on crime rates among concealed carriers, and dozens of states, including those two, allow drinking in establishments that serve alcohol. Where are the news reports of nightly drunken shooting sprees?
GWLSM: what do they kill people over? isn’t the point of owning, say, a pistol, to kill someone? no one hunts deer with a handgun.
Concealed carriers, on the occasions that they have to kill someone, virtually always do it because they fear for their life or the life of someone else.
Also, I’m not even a hunter and I knew that people do all sorts of hunting with handguns. I wasn’t sure about deer, so I Googled “deer hunting with a pistol” and got about a bazillion hits, so you were wrong there too.
GWLSM: gun owners are more attached to their weapons than little kids are attached to their puppies. why? what exactly does a gun do for you? make you feel more of a man? more in love with humanity? more tolerant? better looking? taller? better in bed?
I have no sentimental attachment to mine, though I recognize some do. But are you really so obtuse as to wonder what they do for us? What does your seat belt (potentially) do for you? What do your smoke detectors and fire extinguishers (potentially) do for you? My gun might save my life. Hopefully it will never have to. In the meantime, I get to take it to the range and have fun shooting targets.
Jim,
I think I see what you’re getting at, and I’d say your rhetoric falls flat on it’s face in that last paragraph (although I agree with the rest, I’d caution that in some states finishing the deer with a pistol isn’t legal).
There is no correlation between the right to defend oneself and a forced servitude to the U.S. Gov’t. I would even go so far as to say that the Second Amendment is in place to help the individual protect themselves against Government actions like the draft.
Gyges,
It has to do with defense. The purpose of a CCW is defense.
Jim,
What does the draft have to do with Gun ownership?
gwlawschoolmom,
I was not aware of any place in this country that had liberal and conservative bars. I’ve live all over this country and have never seen such a beast. Do they have signs out front, or do the patrons wear colors?
From your comments, I think it would be reasonable to assume that you haven’t spent much time around guns, or gun owners.
Law abiding gun owners follow the laws. If the law says you don’t bring a gun into a bar…they don’t. If the law says you can bring your gun in, but not if you’re going to consume alcohol; they don’t bring their gun in. –Do you really think a law that says you can’t bring your gun into a bar, if you’re going to consume alcohol, is going to stop those that would ignore the law anyway? -I don’t…We have a name for those people -scofflaws.
JW said; “In any measurable sense, it has not been a problem.”
gwlawschoolmom responded ”really”
Yes. –Really. –If people bringing their guns into a bar, and illegally consuming alcohol, is a problem; please provide support for your claim.
JW said; “People with CCW permits don’t shoot people because of a spilled drink or lost game of pool. That’s because they aren’t criminals, they aren’t nuts, and again with rare exceptions, *they aren’t drinking*.”
Gwlawschoolmom responded; “what do they kill people over? isn’t the point of owning, say, a pistol, to kill someone? no one hunts deer with a handgun.”
How many people with CCW permits have shot someone? The point is not to kill someone. The point is to have the opportunity to defend yourself (or more likely, others) from someone who would like to kill someone. –Further, when I go deer hunting, I always bring my pistol. The rifle won’t do you much good when you’re on top of the deer and find that it still has some life in it. (an injured deer will rip you to shreds with their front hoofs.)
” gun owners are more attached to their weapons than little kids are attached to their puppies. why? what exactly does a gun do for you? make you feel more of a man? more in love with humanity? more tolerant? better looking? taller? better in bed?”
Your prejudice is showing. Are you the same person that said you would move your family out of the country if the draft was instituted? –If you won’t defend your neighborhood, your city, your state, or even your country (because “your people aren’t good at that”) be aware that others will have to do it for you. –Those “taller, better looking, better in bed” gun owners will defend you, should the need arise. You won’t be happy that they even exist..until you need them.
GLSM,
Your bias is showing. I agree that booze and guns don’t mix (as does IS and just about ever gun owner I know). Your characterization of gun owners as drunk hicks is insulting and just plain wrong. Let’s look at the gun owners in my immediate social circle…
A College professor, 3 musicians, 2 general contractors, 2 students, a small business man (who is the single most liberal person I know), someone who does environmental impact studies for the state gov’t, an architect, 3 farmers, and a chiropractor. Of those, 4 have masters or doctorates, 3 have or are working on their bachelors, (possibly more, I don’t know the level of education of every one involved).
Yeah I know that’s all anecdotal, and you may or not believe me about it.
Let’s not be lazy in our thinking. You think that allowing concealed guns in bars is going to lead to more violence, fine. You could try and prove it, as has been pointed out there are plenty of places that have this law, go get statistics. What doesn’t do anyone a bit of good is dismissing those that disagree with you as some group that’s some how lesser than you. (By the way, I’ve actually given this general speech to people arguing the other side as well).
Your flippant and dismissive attitude becomes you as little as it became Domino.
To answer your question: My gun feeds me and my family, and provides me with an enjoyable hobby (target shooting) that helps me stay relaxed and is a valuable exercise in maintaining focus, fine motor skills, and visualization.
IS writes: My wife is a knitter and has recently gotten into spinning wool into yarn. If you want to meet some real crazies go to a knitting shop.
me: hold on there pardner. i happen to be one of those crazies. I spin and dye my own yarn and knit my own designs. I go to yarn shops in very town I visit and have gone to conventions. I’ve used every luxury fiber you can imagine and have even used the undercoat from my dogs to make the softest hardiest socks for my husband for his fly fishing waders. even if my husband would think of me that way, he would not dare say it out loud or share it on a blog. not if he doesn’t want to eat dog food for dinner. anyway your wife needs your support with her new addiction and
she knows where you keep your guns, so my advice, is this: when she needs new yarn or more fiber to spin, you just say “yes, honey, can I drive you to the yarn store”
besides. once she gets good at it,you will be first in line for amazing knitwear.
JW writes: ‘ll try again. Most states that allow concealed carry (and that’s a huge majority of the U.S.), have allowed carry in bars and restaurants that serve alcohol for years. Most of those don’t allow the carrier to drink.
me: okay then. so, let me ask you this…. do bars ask to see your concealed weapon before they serve you? the gun is concealed. the bartender can’t see it. asking if the customer has a weapon and asking to see it may be an illegal search.
JW: In any measurable sense, it has not been a problem.
really.
Jw: People with CCW permits don’t shoot people because of a spilled drink or lost game of pool. That’s because they aren’t criminals, they aren’t nuts, and again with rare exceptions, *they aren’t drinking*.
me: what do they kill people over? isn’t the point of owning, say, a pistol, to kill someone? no one hunts deer with a handgun.
gun owners are more attached to their weapons than little kids are attached to their puppies. why? what exactly does a gun do for you? make you feel more of a man? more in love with humanity? more tolerant? better looking? taller? better in bed?
I don’t get it.
IS writes: I dont think we see much killing in conservative bars either.
I dont handle firearms after drinking bad juju. That was why I disagreed with Arizona.
me: sez you. lets see how many likkered-up gun owners decide to go rambo after a few beers. time will tell.
while we are waiting, what us bad juju? is that some redneck cocktail I haven’t heard of? why would anyone drink it?
Jim asks: Do they have liberal and conservative bars in your neck of the woods?
absolutely.
why wouldn’t they?
IS,
Good points.
Many of those enthusiasts are LEOs. (the shooters..not the knitters)
Mike Spindell:
a good many people like to shoot for recreation-trap; skeet; sporting clays; cowboy; long range target; etc.
The quick draw holster is probably used in shooting competitions. You must have a hobby you are passionate about, they are no different. My wife is a knitter and has recently gotten into spinning wool into yarn. If you want to meet some real crazies go to a knitting shop.