CGofMP
Member
Well, bout time I post something again....
It has certainly been an interesting quarter. I just returned from what officially ended my summer a little bit ago... an eye-opening trip to another country... and I was just awestruck by what I found "out there".
I guess it is true what they say... you really do not know your own country until you have visited another. From my experience this summer, it most assuredly appears to be true.
I live in California... was born and raised here and saw the area I live turned from the last bits of orchard into "Silicon Valley" where you can see office buildings and asphalt in every direction for 10 miles or more. My family stock were true 49ers, folks coming over the great expanses of the United States hoping to work their tails off and make it rich. My Great Grandfather owned a small gold mine that barely paid the bills in the dry southern section of highway 49 and he, my grandfather and his brothers worked long and hard to make end meet. They were no more afraid of personal arms than they were of hard work. My Grandmother came from similar stock. She carried a 22 rifle in her wagon (with her little brother) each day as she went to school. They were taught how to be polite, respectful, and to not tread on other people's rights.
Ahhhhh... I envy them... a time when things were simple, when the mad rush of simply making ends meet did not take up almost all of the waking hours. A time when going into the mountains with your friends to hunt was not looked upon as a scourge or as a social cancer. Hunting was accepted and owning a gun was not something to be apologetic for. Common courtesy was the norm and not a truly remarkable exception. They did not expect others to pay their way, and except where THEY deemed it appropriate to help, they were not expected by society to pay for anyone else. They helped their neighbors and stopped to help strangers when they saw problems.
Until my trip, I no longer thought that this sort of thing still existed. In the rush and bustle of Silicon Valley where people are constantly trying to impress you (and anyone else who will listen) with their obvious wealth, where working is not longer a means to feeding your family, but is a social measure of who has the most plastic in their wallet and who has the biggest SUV.... In a place where people are 'plasticy' and fake it seems to be the norm to act rudely and not give a damn about your neighbor or strangers. In short, we have forgotten what life is all about.
From a Californian's point of view in Silicon Valley, the old fashioned way of life is largely anachronistic... gone, extinct. If you see someone in need of help on the road, pass them by for they may be dangerous! If you do not have a car less than 5 years old people wonder about you. Homes LITERALLY cost 500 thousand to 1 million dollars. Middle class? Its a thin line...
Of course then there are the Statewide politics... California passes the most INSANE laws known to man. We now will give ILLEGAL aliens an official identification document called a driver's licence. We pay them welfare and house them. We pay for their schooling and for their medical bills. Our taxes are out of sight. Property taxes, sales taxes, income taxes, extra gas taxes, school property tax assessments, and that names only a few of the ways they steal what we have and redistribute it to others.
Bureaucrats rule the day here.... 100s of examples could be given, but just as an example ABAG (the bay area pollution control bureaucracy floated a very serious proposal to make it illegal to use fireplaces a few years back because it 'pluted the atmosphere'.. how that did not pass I don't know but it was a miracle it did not. Elected officials can hide behind these appointed droids and pass social and political agendas and be un-assailed at the voting booth because they have an excuse... a panel or committee they can blame.. never mind they approved the appointments.
Politicians are scared to death to take a constitutional stand and when the BEST that the GOP can produce votes for is Arnold Schwarzenegger whose most conservative statement is that he wants to repeal a car tax which was trippled last year and enact "sensible" gun laws.... well lets just say that the very BEST here is way sub-par.
Californians in our elitist wisdom send our representatives out to legislate for the rest of the country. I opine that the 'cream of our crop' are some truly societal DREGS like Feinstein, Lee, Minetta, and Boxer who, again in my opinion, are leftist elitist parasites who do not even believe in their own message (Feinstein reportedly has a concealed handgun permit). We send these people to legislate, nay to FOIST laws on our countrymen - which while acceptable to the liberal sheep in California - are the antitheses of what the citizens of other states want to accept. Yet the politicians in other states are forced to barter and trade away THEIR citizens rights to get California reps to support their pet projects. Our reps, who have never driven the great expanses of the 'fly over' states DARE to make laws which while unconstitutional as they may be could have a modicum of ill-formed logic in the inner city have NO PLACE as laws where neighbors are acres or miles from each other.
One of the worst things however is the culture here against firearms and firearms owners. To admit to being 'into' any sort of firearms sports is to be branded as a potential violent criminal. You are looked down on in this valley much the way people USED to look at those who had Venereal Disease (STD's). If you are a hunter, so much moreso. You kill little animals and nature's creatures?!!?!? What scum you must be... your caste is somewhere beneath those who sell drugs to grade-schoolers. Many times being known to even own a gun make the soccer mom ban her kids from playing at your house.
I could go on and on and on... but suffice it to say this snapshot of life in the San Francisco bay area particularly in Soccer Mom hell (silicon valley where 4WD SUV's never see so much as a dirt driveway) is not too far from reality. Since my trip, I have grown to feeling that this 1 degree at a time polluting of our collective societal norms is totally untenable.
You see I have traveled to another country... one where freedom still has a slippery foothold and one where law-abiding gun owners are not societal pariahs. I have decided that I NEED to escape California for a place where people still act like human beings to one another instead of being immersed in a morass of Orwellian-style minions who are HAPPY about having big-brother's cameras on every corner.
I was amazed when I was outside of California that when I spoke of guns or hunting that this sport was accepted and was in fact encouraged.... most everyone I ran into had a friend who hunted or shot and or they did it themselves. No tears, no hushed tones, no apologies... it's just how it is there.
Most of the people I met were 'real'. They may not have been fond of you but they were polite for the most part and in almost all cases fairly decent folks. I have NO illusions that everyone is like this... nor do I believe that moving out of here would be a panacea where the whole world is sunshine, happiness, and joy. It would require hard work, sacrifice, and tenacity.... but gawd it would be worth it.
I found places where the taxes were not nearly as overwhelming as here. I am used to adding 8.5 percent in my mind to all purchases. Such a small thing as paying for a gallon of Prestone and realizing I did not need that extra dollar out to pay for tax was somehow a minor epiphany... "It does not HAVE to be like it is at home!" If only things were like this in "my 'country'".
I must tell you that I really enjoyed my trip to Utah, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.... this trip "out of my country" showed me that there still are some places where things have not completely devolved into a socialist and elitist driven society. I was forced at one point to stay with semi-strangers because the car lost a water pump. I figured it was incumbent upon me (since they had small children) to let them know that I had a handgun and wanted a safe place to store it (having no CCW/CHL for these places) being 'California-brainwashed' I asked in a hushed and an almost apologetic fashion, but to them it was no big deal at all and they noted that they had guns safely stored too.
(Note: Even the small-town mechanics did not try to totally soak me for all they could, and gave this 'California tourist' a decent deal on the repairs.)
In short, I should not be taken aback by this experience but I guess I was. It was a very positive culture shock for me. People that have some of the same old fashioned cultural and political values that I do were not hard to find in these places. This is juxtaposed to this area of California where finding like minded people is like finding gold in a septic tank.
In truth, in many of these rural areas I felt 'at home' instead of like a porcupine in a condom factory.
I do not know how I will do it... my 'official' job skills are computer related and even those are extremely limited and are specialized to the point of absurdity... but somehow I am going to find a way to escape this bastion of mental-illness and find a place where taxes are low, where homes are affordable, and where I do not need to be concerned that my state representatives are trying to do away with my rights.. at least not on an hourly basis and where things are more laid back and hard work is rewarded but is not the sole measure of the family.
Who knows... I may even someday get a 'shall issue' CCW or even a class 3 toy....
Well, I can dream right?
Charles
It has certainly been an interesting quarter. I just returned from what officially ended my summer a little bit ago... an eye-opening trip to another country... and I was just awestruck by what I found "out there".
I guess it is true what they say... you really do not know your own country until you have visited another. From my experience this summer, it most assuredly appears to be true.
I live in California... was born and raised here and saw the area I live turned from the last bits of orchard into "Silicon Valley" where you can see office buildings and asphalt in every direction for 10 miles or more. My family stock were true 49ers, folks coming over the great expanses of the United States hoping to work their tails off and make it rich. My Great Grandfather owned a small gold mine that barely paid the bills in the dry southern section of highway 49 and he, my grandfather and his brothers worked long and hard to make end meet. They were no more afraid of personal arms than they were of hard work. My Grandmother came from similar stock. She carried a 22 rifle in her wagon (with her little brother) each day as she went to school. They were taught how to be polite, respectful, and to not tread on other people's rights.
Ahhhhh... I envy them... a time when things were simple, when the mad rush of simply making ends meet did not take up almost all of the waking hours. A time when going into the mountains with your friends to hunt was not looked upon as a scourge or as a social cancer. Hunting was accepted and owning a gun was not something to be apologetic for. Common courtesy was the norm and not a truly remarkable exception. They did not expect others to pay their way, and except where THEY deemed it appropriate to help, they were not expected by society to pay for anyone else. They helped their neighbors and stopped to help strangers when they saw problems.
Until my trip, I no longer thought that this sort of thing still existed. In the rush and bustle of Silicon Valley where people are constantly trying to impress you (and anyone else who will listen) with their obvious wealth, where working is not longer a means to feeding your family, but is a social measure of who has the most plastic in their wallet and who has the biggest SUV.... In a place where people are 'plasticy' and fake it seems to be the norm to act rudely and not give a damn about your neighbor or strangers. In short, we have forgotten what life is all about.
From a Californian's point of view in Silicon Valley, the old fashioned way of life is largely anachronistic... gone, extinct. If you see someone in need of help on the road, pass them by for they may be dangerous! If you do not have a car less than 5 years old people wonder about you. Homes LITERALLY cost 500 thousand to 1 million dollars. Middle class? Its a thin line...
Of course then there are the Statewide politics... California passes the most INSANE laws known to man. We now will give ILLEGAL aliens an official identification document called a driver's licence. We pay them welfare and house them. We pay for their schooling and for their medical bills. Our taxes are out of sight. Property taxes, sales taxes, income taxes, extra gas taxes, school property tax assessments, and that names only a few of the ways they steal what we have and redistribute it to others.
Bureaucrats rule the day here.... 100s of examples could be given, but just as an example ABAG (the bay area pollution control bureaucracy floated a very serious proposal to make it illegal to use fireplaces a few years back because it 'pluted the atmosphere'.. how that did not pass I don't know but it was a miracle it did not. Elected officials can hide behind these appointed droids and pass social and political agendas and be un-assailed at the voting booth because they have an excuse... a panel or committee they can blame.. never mind they approved the appointments.
Politicians are scared to death to take a constitutional stand and when the BEST that the GOP can produce votes for is Arnold Schwarzenegger whose most conservative statement is that he wants to repeal a car tax which was trippled last year and enact "sensible" gun laws.... well lets just say that the very BEST here is way sub-par.
Californians in our elitist wisdom send our representatives out to legislate for the rest of the country. I opine that the 'cream of our crop' are some truly societal DREGS like Feinstein, Lee, Minetta, and Boxer who, again in my opinion, are leftist elitist parasites who do not even believe in their own message (Feinstein reportedly has a concealed handgun permit). We send these people to legislate, nay to FOIST laws on our countrymen - which while acceptable to the liberal sheep in California - are the antitheses of what the citizens of other states want to accept. Yet the politicians in other states are forced to barter and trade away THEIR citizens rights to get California reps to support their pet projects. Our reps, who have never driven the great expanses of the 'fly over' states DARE to make laws which while unconstitutional as they may be could have a modicum of ill-formed logic in the inner city have NO PLACE as laws where neighbors are acres or miles from each other.
One of the worst things however is the culture here against firearms and firearms owners. To admit to being 'into' any sort of firearms sports is to be branded as a potential violent criminal. You are looked down on in this valley much the way people USED to look at those who had Venereal Disease (STD's). If you are a hunter, so much moreso. You kill little animals and nature's creatures?!!?!? What scum you must be... your caste is somewhere beneath those who sell drugs to grade-schoolers. Many times being known to even own a gun make the soccer mom ban her kids from playing at your house.
I could go on and on and on... but suffice it to say this snapshot of life in the San Francisco bay area particularly in Soccer Mom hell (silicon valley where 4WD SUV's never see so much as a dirt driveway) is not too far from reality. Since my trip, I have grown to feeling that this 1 degree at a time polluting of our collective societal norms is totally untenable.
You see I have traveled to another country... one where freedom still has a slippery foothold and one where law-abiding gun owners are not societal pariahs. I have decided that I NEED to escape California for a place where people still act like human beings to one another instead of being immersed in a morass of Orwellian-style minions who are HAPPY about having big-brother's cameras on every corner.
I was amazed when I was outside of California that when I spoke of guns or hunting that this sport was accepted and was in fact encouraged.... most everyone I ran into had a friend who hunted or shot and or they did it themselves. No tears, no hushed tones, no apologies... it's just how it is there.
Most of the people I met were 'real'. They may not have been fond of you but they were polite for the most part and in almost all cases fairly decent folks. I have NO illusions that everyone is like this... nor do I believe that moving out of here would be a panacea where the whole world is sunshine, happiness, and joy. It would require hard work, sacrifice, and tenacity.... but gawd it would be worth it.
I found places where the taxes were not nearly as overwhelming as here. I am used to adding 8.5 percent in my mind to all purchases. Such a small thing as paying for a gallon of Prestone and realizing I did not need that extra dollar out to pay for tax was somehow a minor epiphany... "It does not HAVE to be like it is at home!" If only things were like this in "my 'country'".
I must tell you that I really enjoyed my trip to Utah, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.... this trip "out of my country" showed me that there still are some places where things have not completely devolved into a socialist and elitist driven society. I was forced at one point to stay with semi-strangers because the car lost a water pump. I figured it was incumbent upon me (since they had small children) to let them know that I had a handgun and wanted a safe place to store it (having no CCW/CHL for these places) being 'California-brainwashed' I asked in a hushed and an almost apologetic fashion, but to them it was no big deal at all and they noted that they had guns safely stored too.
(Note: Even the small-town mechanics did not try to totally soak me for all they could, and gave this 'California tourist' a decent deal on the repairs.)
In short, I should not be taken aback by this experience but I guess I was. It was a very positive culture shock for me. People that have some of the same old fashioned cultural and political values that I do were not hard to find in these places. This is juxtaposed to this area of California where finding like minded people is like finding gold in a septic tank.
In truth, in many of these rural areas I felt 'at home' instead of like a porcupine in a condom factory.
I do not know how I will do it... my 'official' job skills are computer related and even those are extremely limited and are specialized to the point of absurdity... but somehow I am going to find a way to escape this bastion of mental-illness and find a place where taxes are low, where homes are affordable, and where I do not need to be concerned that my state representatives are trying to do away with my rights.. at least not on an hourly basis and where things are more laid back and hard work is rewarded but is not the sole measure of the family.
Who knows... I may even someday get a 'shall issue' CCW or even a class 3 toy....
Well, I can dream right?
Charles
