I’m a libertarian. I believe that government FAR overreaches its rights. I think the government would be much more effective if it were about 1/2 of 1% of the size it is now.

I believe that the only morally correct laws are laws that protect people from aggression against their person or property. I think that the only things that should be illegal are murder, rape, assault, theft, fraud, and trespassing.

A large force that has always been active in American politics is what I call CCCs, i.e. Christian Conservative Constitutionalists. Ronald Reagan was one. The John Birch Society would fit that description.  The Constitution Party do. Many LDS do. This CCC force is “making a comeback”, often in the form of people who claim to be part of the Tea Party, like Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck.

I agree with about 95% of what most of these folks believe in. For instance,

• I believe in the right to keep and bear arms, without limitation.
• I want lower taxes.
• I do not believe in bailouts or “too big to fail.”
• I think welfare (of all kinds) should be slashed to the bone, and/or eliminated.
• I believe that homeschooling should be legal and easy, and the public schools should even be phased out.
• I believe in the right of people to worship as they please (for instance, I’m appalled that a kid got kicked out of school for wearing a rosary. I don’t think that voluntarily wearing a rosary to public school violates any kind of “separation of church and state.”)
• I oppose “hate crime laws” (murder and assault are already illegal, adding time for what you were thinking while committing the crime is racist.)
• I’m against Affirmative Action (I think it’s racist.)
• I believe the borders should be closed (at least until all freebie incentives are removed).
• I’m in favor of term limits.
• I believe that abuses of Eminent Domain should be eliminated.
• I am a big fan of Castle Doctrine.
• I’m a strong believer in States’ Rights.
• I’m against unlawful wiretaps and illegal search and seizure.
• I am appalled by the march of socialism and I fear and hate the Obama administration’s hostile takeover of America.

HOWEVER, most CCCs believe that drugs, porn, prostitution, gambling and gay marriage should also be illegal. SHOW ME WHERE IN THE CONSTITUTION, OR IN NATURAL LAW, YOU CAN JUSTIFY THOSE THINGS BEING ILLEGAL! That’s my problem with CCCs. If they were in power, we would have a wonderful Constitutional Republic for about 95% of things, but something amounting to Christian Sharia for the other 5%.

NO LAW IS MORALLY JUST UNLESS IT PROTECTS THE PERSON OR PROPERTY OF OTHERS. It is immoral to try to force the government to force YOU to act “moral.” Trying to make the state regulate your husband from looking at porn or keeping your wife from gambling is lazy nanny-state bullshit, and is not morally acceptable. And it certainly isn’t Constitutional and does not conform to Natural Law (which is the only MORAL law.)

I don’t do drugs, but I am convinced that drugs should be 100% legal. The War on Drugs does far more harm than good, and ruins far more lives than it helps. It costs billions in taxes, jails and lawyers, and encourages violent crime. Prohibition didn’t work for alcohol and it ain’t working for drugs. Besides outlawing drugs (or porn or gambling) will NEVER stop drugs (or porn or gambling.) Outlawing these things won’t even minimize them. People will do them anyway.

Thomas Jefferson said “The Constitution on which our Union rests, shall be administered… according to the safe and honest meaning contemplated by the plain understanding of the people of the United States at the time of its adoption...” Well, at the time of The Constitution’s adoption, Thomas Jefferson and George Washington grew (and likely smoked) marijuana and Benjamin Franklin slept with many French whores.

My favorite Wyoming candidate for Governor, the best candidate we’ve got, the guy I’m voting for, Ron Micheli, said in a recent interview that he thinks porn should be illegal and marriage should be defined as being between a man and a woman. Porn illegal? How is that moral. How can you even SAY that? Show me in The Constitution, or Natural Law, where outlawing porn is even moral. (And my thought on marriage? Take the state out of the equation. The STATE has no right to be involved. Marriage should be between two people and maybe their church. As a libertarian comedian Doug Stanhope once said “If marriage didn’t exist, would you invent it? Would you go ‘Baby, this shit we got together, it’s so good we gotta get the government in on this shit. We can’t just share this commitment between us. We need judges and lawyers involved in this shit, baby. It’s hot!’”)

Doug Stanhope for president

Enforcing random nanny laws (like outlawing pot, porn and gambling) will lead to tyranny. It will pave the way for a new Hitler, whether the nannying comes from the right or the left. I don’t think Obama is Hitler. But I think that Obama is paving the way for a Hitler (or Stalin), a few presidents from now, at the rate things are going. AND CHRISTIAN “CONSERVATIVE” GEORGE BUSH HELPED HIM. Every time someone’s in “power”, for the last hundred years, they’ve chipped away a little more at the Constitution, at Natural Law, and added more and more bullshit, thinking their party will be in “power” forever. But with the next changing of the guard, the other party abuses those “powers” even more, in the opposite direction.

“The problem isn’t Democrats. The problem is Republicans who aren’t willing to become libertarians”

–Libertarian Christian Boston T. Party.

The only solution I can really see for NOT having a Hitler running America into the ground in ten or twenty years is GET RID OF THE NANNY-STATE BULLSHIT on the left and GET RID OF THE CHRISTIAN SHARIA on the right. Concentrate on the basic human rights governance, abide only by Natural Law, strip government down to near nothing, get rid of “special” rights, and only protect human rights. (Hint: free health care is not a “human right”, because it’s not free. Someone else has to pay for it, and the government forces them at gunpoint to pay. That’s not a human right!)

I’m not going to “waste my vote” on a third party. I’m going to back TRUE libertarian candidates (not CCCs) operating within the Republican Party. I think that’s the plan that’s got the best plan. (Rand Paul for president anyone?)

And from a simple logistical standpoint, the CCCs should re-evaluate their plan. CCCs are NEVER gonna get the “youth vote” or the “hipster vote”, which is a large part of the vote. Only Libertarian Republicans can attract the youngsters.

If a more-libertarian Republican Party can’t save America, nothing can. If it can’t, my prediction is that in five or ten years, we’ll all “party like it’s 1775.” And if that happens, I’ll likely be shoulder to shoulder with the CCCs, saying “How the fuck did you let this happen? Oh well, you did let it happen, now let’s fix it. So praise God and pass the ammunition.”

–Michael W. Dean

Michael W. Dean is the Wyoming representative for the Republican Liberty Caucus. His views are his own.

(More pictures up now!  Part one is here, part two is here.)

Looks like the location for a Dethklok video:

How cool is it to be able to drive a few hours and take a vacation that people fly around the world to take?

WE LOVE WYOMING!

After 11 months of running around Wyoming (always with guns, often with guns carried openly), tonight we had our first cop encounter in Wyoming ever.

Tonight we were on the way to the post office. DJ was driving, I was in the passenger seat. As usual when we drive, I had a loaded revolver on my hip in a belt holster, and another loaded revolver in the open glove box in front of me, in plain site, and within quick grabbing range.

Suddenly, we got pulled over by the police. Young male cop walked up to DJ’s window. I kept my hands where he could see them.

Cop: Ma’am, the reason I stopped you is you were going 40 in a 30. Any reason for that?

DJ: Yes sir. I’m sorry sir. Just inattention.

Cop: OK. May I see your driver’s license and insurance please?

DJ: Yes sir. (Reaches by her feet to her purse, gets her license and hands it to cop.)

DJ (to me): The insurance is in the glove compartment…

Me: Officer, before I reach in there, I wanted to point out that….

Cop (cheerily): Yeah,…I see the gun.

I reach past the gun, get the insurance and hand it to DJ who hands it to the cop. He looks at it, hands it back to her, takes her license and goes back to his patrol car. He called in on the radio, came back to our car, handed DJ her license and said, “OK ma’am. Please be more attentive. I’d hate to see you have an accident on such a pretty day.”

He didn’t give her a ticket, we said ‘Thank you”, and he left.

WHAT WAS AWESOME ABOUT ALL THIS:

Well, it wasn’t California.

It’s very rare in California to NOT get a ticket when you’re pulled over for speeding. But moreover, having a loaded gun sticking out of your open glove box in California would not result in a polite “Yeah, I see the gun.” It would result in another gun being pointed at your head, commands being screamed, you being pulled out of the car, you being thrown to the ground, handcuffed, backup being called, you being arrested, processed and jailed.

But really, what was awesome about this is that a cop didn’t treat us as potentially dangerous and/or as needing a babysitter/parental supervision/nannying. Looking back on almost every interaction either of us has ever had with cops, they almost invariably treated us potentially dangerous and/or as needing a babysitter/parental supervision/nannying. Having a cop treat us as adults and not dangerous was pretty damn cool.

And NOT getting a ticket was just icing on top of that.

– Michael W. Dean

Got my Wyoming concealed carry permit today. Meant more to me than when I got my driver’s license. (I didn’t get a driver’s license until I was 21, and never really drove much.) Getting a concealed weapon permit is a large part of the reason I moved to Wyoming….getting one is pretty much impossible in Los Angeles County, unless you’re a movie star or a judge.

You have to live in Wyoming six months before you can apply, and it took a month to get it. I’ve been here seven months, and have been open carrying the whole time. It was a trip to actually conceal carry, walk down the street, go to the library, go eat lunch with the wife. It felt good, like walking on the moon.

The libertarian in me doesn’t like the idea of needing a government-endorsed card to practice an inalienable right, but the Republican in me digs being able to get the card, and getting it.

Ironically for me, the Wyoming legislature is currently mulling a bill that would allow concealed carry without a permit, and that bill may pass. (Yay!). But my permit will still allow me to carry in Utah, the Dakotas, Montana and a bunch of other states. (Not New York or California though! Those places are no friends of freedom.)

Also ironic is that my permit was available yesterday for pickup, but it was Presidents’ Day, so the office was closed. “President’s Day” is what they call it, but it’s officially called “George Washington’s Birthday”, and I think George would have been appalled at the idea of needing a permit to carry a gun. He didn’t need no stinking papers to carry!

Anyway, it’s a really good day, and I’m very happy!

–Michael W. Dean

My Taurus  jammed while shooting .38 special plus P ammo. I got the spent shells out, but the gun won’t close easily now, and you can barely pull the trigger.
Fortunately, Taurus guns covered by a lifetime guarantee, not just lifetime of the owner, but the life of the GUN, so even if you buy one second-hand, it’s still covered.

UPDATE, ONE MONTH LATER: Got it back from Taurus, 4 weeks to the day after sending it in, it’s now working better than ever.

I’ll carry my S&W 908 semi-auto until I get it back (could take Taurus a few months, I’ve heard) but I am going to ALWAYS carry at least the mouse gun (Ruger .380 LCP) as a backup. What if I’d needed the Taurus in a life-and-death situation and it failed, and I had no backup?

I got the gun new, and have fired maybe 1000 rd through it over a few months. Mostly .357, some .38.

FWIW, the brand of ammo I was firing when it jammed was Blazer, but I don’t think it’s an ammo issue. Those rounds have a lot less power than the .357s I usually use.

WHY REVOLVERS?

Someone asked me “why do people still buy revolvers”?

People buy revolvers for the reason people still buy hammers. Because it may be an old design, but they work (despite my exception, which is so rare it proves the rule).

They fail less than most semi-autos, they’re cheaper.

They’re actually great guns for people with no experience with guns. If you ever buy a gun for someone, like a girlfriend or wife, who’s willing to carry a gun, but not willing to really become a “gun person”, a revolver is great. No safety to forget to turn off, not mag disconnect to accidentally hit, just point, and pull trigger. The trigger is so hard it acts as a safety, but you can also cock the trigger with your thumb to get a shorter trigger pull. (Which also has the psychological effect on whoever you’re pointing it at,….think Dirty Harry).

And why snubbies? A .357 revolver is the most power you can pack in the smallest form. Someone described a .357 snubbie as being like the “Noisy Cricket” gun from Men in Black.

And Snubbies can be fired from inside the pocket if need be. A semi-auto, not so much, because the slide has to move. Also, revolvers do not engage a spring until you pull the trigger. You could probably leave a loaded revolver in a drawer for half a century, and it would still work when you pulled the trigger. A loaded semi-auto with a bullet in the chamber would probably seize up or the spring would break in that amount of time.

Plus all revolvers look and feel cool and retro, and have a lot of history. They were the first usable multi-shot handguns. “God mad man, but Sam Colt made them equal.”

Revolvers have very few moving parts

compared to semi-autos

more on revolvers:

http://www.snubnose.info/

http://www.snubnose.info/history.htm

http://www.sixguns.com/range/Mademag.htm

http://www.handloads.com/articles/default.asp?id=30

http://www.notpurfect.com/main/concealed.html

Revolvers are much less affected by dust and dirt, require less cleaning and oiling, and are much easier to clean. (for what it’s worth, I cleaned mine often, and carried in a holster, which prevents pocket lint from getting in, but many people carry snubbies in a coat pocket. I don’t recommend that, for dirt, but also because in a holster, you KNOW what position it’s going to be in when you need to grab for it in an adrenaline situation.)

I’m psyched today. My concealed carry permit is waiting for me to pick up at the sheriff”s office . Yay! I’ve wanted one for two years and more or less moved to Wyoming so I could get one!

MWD