Saturday, September 28, 2013

Greetings fellow Bizarros:

I have had it with the gun control debate. It is time somebody came up with a solution that will actually work, and that somebody is me.

The problem with gun control is the Second Amendment. The Second Amendment guarantees our freedom from tyranny by protecting the citizens' right to keep and bear arms. An armed populace is a free populace.

On the other hand, allowing every yahoo, gang banger and psychotic access to firearms has given the United States one of the highest murder rates in the developed world (although we can't compete with places like Honduras or El Salvador).

You would think that reasonable restrictions to firearms wouldn't be that difficult of a thing to figure out. The issue is with the word 'reasonable.' Because once you start chipping away at that freedom, more and more restrictions follow until one day you find that you don't have that right anymore.

So let's go back to the source problem. Protecting the right of the populace to protect itself from tyranny. Looked at from that perspective the solution becomes obvious. Disarm everyone.

If nobody is armed you won't have anybody to protect yourself from.

We would start by disarming the population. This process would take years because right now, based on consolidated information from the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, there are about 300 millions guns in the United States. And since there is very little registration it is impossible to know exactly who owns them.

But once we are reasonable sure firearms have been eradicated from the general population, we can disarm the police. This phase would go much faster, since we know who the police are and they are a much smaller population.

The final phase would be the military. This would probably take the longest since the U.S. military industrial complex is so vast. But once the final phase is accomplished, gun violence in the United States would finally be a thing of the past.

There would have to be exceptions, of course. Like the Coast Guard, for example, border patrol, perhaps a very limited armed navy to protect shipping in foreign waters, but 99 percent of guns (and gun violence) and most importantly the reason for guns will have been eliminated.

Now before the detractors begin tearing my plan apart I would like you to consider all of the other nations of the world who already operate on a similar system, like Liechtenstein, Andorra and the Federated States of Micronesia.

All we need is the determination to do what has to be done.

Bizarrely,
Lewis

Questions? Comments? Email Lewis


*-- German 'Forest Boy' gets community service after hoax --*
BERLIN - "Forest Boy," who duped German officials into believing he lived in the wilderness for years, was sentenced to community service Thursday for fraud. Robin van Helsum, in his early 20s, gained fame in 2011 when he entered Berlin's City Hall and claimed to be "Ray," a dweller in a nearby forest. He said he did not know his last name, and had lived in the wilderness since his father's death in a fall, NBC News reported. His story was uncovered as a hoax after his photograph appeared in European media. A woman in the Netherlands contacted police in 2012 to report "Forest Boy" was her stepson, who disappeared the previous year. A legal settlement was arranged Thursday during his trial for fraud, in which prosecutors demanded van Helsum return approximately 30,000 euros ($40,445) he received from German youth organizations. Court spokesman Tobias Kaehne said van Helsum could have received a similar amount in government benefits as a homeless adult, and thus would not be ordered to make financial restitution. "The loss to the taxpayer is either nothing or very small," Kaehne said.


*-- Boy, 7, sues after novelty pen classifies him as 'weapons offender' --*
HARRISBURG, Pa. - A 7-year-old boy is suing a Pennsylvania school district over its weapons policy after he was suspended for having a novelty pen on a bus, his lawyer said. Officials in the Derry School District in Dauphin County, Pa., gave the boy -- identified in the federal lawsuit as G.B. -- a four-day suspension and branded him a "weapons offender" for possessing the pen, which emits a small electrical shock when the cap is pressed, the Philadelphia Daily News reported Thursday. G.B. is a second-grader at Hershey Elementary School in Hershey, Pa., the newspaper added. "A sharpened pencil is probably a more dangerous item than this pen was," said the boy's attorney Aaron Martin, who noted the goal of the suit is to clear the boy's name and to clarify what can be brought to school. The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Harrisburg, Pa., claims the boy is classified as a violator of the school's weapons policy, his disciplinary record is permanently "marred," and he is "relegated to the same category as violent criminals" and terrorists.


*-- READER COMMENTS --*
In reply to Craig: Unions do very LITTLE power themselves for their members. Job security is done with the FEDERAL government saying that businesses have to have a GOOD reason to fire somebody. As for RAISES unions just FORCE businesses to give RAISES to unproductive employees. Good employees can get raises easily. And as far as benefits go the workers themselves are the people that determines what benefits they get. The ONLY real help the unions give their member is when the employees of small businesses have GOOD employees that do NOT assert themselves to get raises they deserve. Anything else the unions have almost NO power to force the business to cave to their wishes, unless the unions can ENCOURAGE the employees to strike for higher wage/benefits and the business can give in or shut down. The businesses can give in or CLOSE down and put the employees out of work.

Hey Lewis, I would bet that was a caucasian couple in that van no doubt. They of all people think of the craziest things to do! -Amanda

I don't know which would be scarier- the people in costume or the Nude folks coming in and walking around.(ESPECIALLY me!) -Bill

Lewis: Seeing people (alone or with someone) having sex while driving may be uncommon in Chicago, but is so common in LA and San Francisco that after a while you don't even notice. -Jim

*-- END OF READER COMMENTS --*
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