Breathtaking

More guns.  More guns are better.

I saw two stories today about guns.  And both of them made me sick to my stomach.

The first one I saw had this headline:  "Line-Cutting Dispute At Roadside Food Stand Leads To Fatal Shooting."  "A dispute over line-cutting at a roadside food stand led to the shooting death of a bystander and the serious injury of another man, Tampa police said."

Then I saw a story - yet another one - about the carrying of semi-automatic weapons.  To Town Hall meetings.  Where the President was going to be speaking.  

This particular story centers around a Town Hall meeting in Arizona.  Apparently Arizona has an open carry gun law.  What does that mean?  Well, after doing about a half hour of research on Arizona's gun laws, I'm not entirely sure.  There are a lot of laws, most of which seem to say - Hey, it's fine.  Don't worry about.  You can have one.  Loaded.  Pretty much anywhere.  If Wikipedia is to be trusted, in Arizona, "on foot, no permit is required to openly carry a firearm in a belt holster, gun case or scabbard. Generally, a person must be at least 18 years of age to openly carry a firearm."  That's just one quote.  There are many, many more.

Have we, as a nation, completely lost our fucking minds?  When did gun rights translate into any gun, any time, any where?  Public parks.  Bars.  An event where the President of the United States will be speaking.  I just don't get it.

In other remarkable news today, the Department of Justice issued a brief which seeks "to throw out a lawsuit brought by a gay couple challenging the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA."  Obama's administration is playing both ends against the middle (politically speaking, that is) by saying that they must file the brief because it is their duty to follow the law (ummm....they didn't have to file any brief) but then went on to say that the discriminatory practices involved in the law would be looked into and that the President "plans to work with Congress to repeal the law."  

Joe Solmonese, President of HRC had this to say:  "Now the President must take a leadership role in repealing DOMA. It is not enough to disavow this discriminatory law, and then wait for Congress or the courts to act. While they contend that it is the DOJ’s duty to defend an act of Congress, we contend that it is the Administration’s duty to defend every citizen from discrimination."

One of two things is happening with Obama and his treatment of gay people, and neither one of them is very pretty.  Either his prejudices are such that he thinks that we, as gay Americans, don't deserve the same freedoms, liberties, responsibilities and rights as straight people - in which case we truly were had.  And cheaply, I might add.  Or, and perhaps this is actually worse, he does believe that we deserve equality under the law but doesn't have the balls to stand up and say so due to political fear.  Time will tell if he will be the "fierce advocate" he claimed he would be.  So far, with "fierce advocates" like him...

And finally, a little Michele Bachmann fun.  It seems that she has proudly cast herself as the original, and next, Sarah Palin.  

Minnesota State Senator Tarryl Clark, Bachmann's Democratic challenger, said this to The Huffington Post:  "For many in Minnesota, when Sarah Palin came on the scene it seemed like she was Alaska's Michelle Bachmann...They seem to share some similarities."  Clearly, Clark meant it as a dig.

For her part, Bachmann seems to love the idea.  ""With Gov. Palin taking a well-deserved step out of the spotlight, it appears that I may be absorbing even more of the liberals' scorn," she said.

After many, many signs that Michele Bachmann lives on another planet, this statement seems to be the clearest.  Does she really think that EX-Governor Palin is going to stepping out of the spotlight?