I don’t fit the “old white guy” mold, and I’ve noticed it throws people off.
A few years back, I lined up at the mic during a meeting on campus carry. The middle-aged woman in front of me, sporting a Bloomberg-funded organization sticker, told me to take her place because “they need to hear from people like you.” I thanked her and made my comments at the mic—and proceeded to blow her mind when I, as a young female, revealed that I wasn’t supporting her cause.
It obviously hadn’t occurred to her that I might actually be in favor of protecting my right to keep and bear arms.
Police officers in the United States engage in all manner of bad behavior, such as excessive force, sexual misconduct, financial impropriety, and the manipulation of evidence. Holding them to account criminally, civilly, or professionally is extremely difficult, even in cases involving blatant malpractice and misconduct.
Over the past five years, as demands for reform have mounted in the aftermath of police violence in cities like Ferguson, Mo., Baltimore and now Minneapolis, police unions have emerged as one of the most significant roadblocks to change. The greater the political pressure for reform, the more defiant the unions often are in resisting it — with few city officials, including liberal leaders, able to overcome their opposition.
For years, Philadelphia has been run by liberal progressives who oppose private gun ownership. In Philadelphia, a permit is required to carry a gun or transport one in a vehicle. Although Pennsylvania state law prohibits Philadelphia from enacting all of the gun control measures the city’s leaders wish, the city’s website reads like a gun control propaganda sheet.
Philosophical figures as diverse as “traditionalist” Edmund Burke and “naturalist” George Santayana have stated similar versions of the phrase, “Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” And today, many Americans are “learning that they’ve learned.”
They remember the indie Koreatown store owners who, often left without police protection during the 1992 Los Angeles Rodney King Beating riots, defended their lives, their property, and the well-being of their neighbors, by wielding guns against the wilding hordes.
Cesia Baires knocks on the three apartment doors above her restaurant and a neighboring taqueria just before curfew.
A woman opens the door. Her two young children are inside.
"Remember," she says to them in Spanish. "Same thing as yesterday. I'm going to come check on you. If there's anything you guys need, give us a call right away."
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Police officers in the United States engage in all manner of bad behavior, such as excessive force, sexual misconduct, financial impropriety, and the manipulation of evidence. Holding them to account criminally, civilly, or professionally is extremely difficult, even in cases involving blatant malpractice and misconduct.
For years, Philadelphia has been run by liberal progressives who oppose private gun ownership. In Philadelphia, a permit is required to carry a gun or transport one in a vehicle. Although Pennsylvania state law prohibits Philadelphia from enacting all of the gun control measures the city’s leaders wish, the city’s website reads like a gun control propaganda sheet.
Cesia Baires knocks on the three apartment doors above her restaurant and a neighboring taqueria just before curfew.