It is interesting to note in today’s NYTimes that gun sales did very well throughout the country with the expectation that Barack Obama would win the election.  One serious buyer (who wanted just one more gun to add to the two he already owns) claims that Mr. Obama wanted to “snatch” his gun and this was one of the liabilities of Socialism.  How nutty can you get?

I am not at all sorry that my 1918 model of a bolt action German rifle is gone.  Carol insisted that she did not want it in the house.  I thought it was a great relic and souvenir from my time in the Army.  For years I had it on brackets above the door leading into the garage from the utility room in our house in Long Branch. It was removed at her demand that it be out of sight, so I put it into the leather case I made for it when I first brought it home from Germany and stuffed it into the back of a closet.  I had no ammunition for the weapon so it was merely an artifact and decoration such as the flintlock rifles forgotten over mantle pieces in many early American homes.

But, then I got to thinking about the silliness of my owning that gun.  First, I had fired it only once in France where piles of these weapons were made available for American soldiers as souvenirs.  Over the years I had read that old ammunition degrades and cannot be depended upon.  Then, too, where can you get new ammunition for an old gun of foreign manufacture?  I looked into the serious hobby of filling empty shells with gun powder and making the ammunition for oneself.  This was going a bit too far since I did not want to regularly go to a shooting range and practicing.  This was not my thing.  Going into the woods and shooting animals that could not shoot back seemed to be unfair.  Anyway, when you killed the animal I think you were obligated to skin it, eviscerate it and prepare the skin for a hat, blanket or robe of some sort – that is if it were bigger than a squirrel or a rabbit. I did not think of killing those harmless animals was the purpose of this military weapon meant to kill humans.

And, then, too, there was that issue of it being a Socialistic requirement that people give up their guns.  I have taught history for years and never came across the equation of gun ownership or personal use with the tenets of Socialism.  I do think that owning a gun is good and just even if it is just for possessing a technologically neat instrument.  Guns can be works of art as well as instruments for destruction of life.

For one last time I advance the idea to regulate owning ammunition rather than restricting gun ownership.  If that be Socialism – so be it.