America the Arming Camp

I was sitting on my front porch minding my own business when a man with a handlebar moustache and a pistol buckled around his waist walks up.

“Who’re you?” asks I.

“Name’s Armo Bandolero. I’m here checkling out the Arming Camp.”

“Army Camp? There’s no army camp around here.”

“No, Senor Newshawk, I say Arming Camp.”

“I don’t think I understand what you’re talking about,” I said.

“The U.S. is becoming an arming camp.  So many people are buying guns. Did you realize there are 13 million people in the U.S. with concealed carry permits?”

“You don’t say!”

“But I do! Americans are arming themselves against criminals and terrorists.”

“That’s a good idea, I think. And Mexicans, too. We could do with a few less Mexicans.”

“Perhaps, Senor,” but he didn’t like me saying it. “It seems as though we are returning to the days of the Old West – everybody carrying a gun to protect themselves. Some didn’t carry a gun, of course - said they didn’t believe in them - but a lot of them ended up dead. Can you imagine a guy in, say, Dodge City, Kansas, in the 1880s who said he didn’t believe in guns? Yippee-chay-aa, bang, bang.”

“Yessir, reckon that’s what would happen, all right. Bang. Bang. You’re dead. Right, Senor Bandolero?”

“Si.

“That’s a good reason to have guns confiscated, one would think. Not that I think that way. It’s the way people in blue states and in Washington think.”

“Si, but you know, Senor Newshawk, there are many people in law enforcement who are publicly asking off-duty policemen and people with concealed carry permits to carry their weapons at all times. There are many instances in which a person with a gun has saved the life of the victim of a crime.”

“Now there’s a request I didn’t see coming. It really is becoming an Arming Camp, isn’t it? You know, I’ve heard that the government plans to take away food stamps someday soon, and there will be thieves prowling the streets intending to break into people’s homes and steal their food. Boy, are they going to be in for a surprise! Huh?”

“Si. Pow! Pow!” drawing his pistol and twirling it on a finger, playing cowboy. “Take that, food thief! We should hang food thieves, like they hanged horse thieves in the Old West.”

“Yeah, and car thieves, too, and pickpockets. We could have a necktie party every Friday at noon. None of this crap where those on death row get to hang around at our expense and exhaust one appeal after another for 25 years. You kill somebody on Monday, you hang Friday at noon.”

“Wow. Yeah. Think of the savings of taxpayer money! What a great idea!” says Bandalero.

“You know, with all the great ideas we conservatives have for cleaning up the criminal element in the U.S., why are Liberals so opposed to us owning guns?”

“Oh, ho, that’s an easy one, Senor Newshawk. They’re afraid we’ll get tired of their crap and start using them for target practice.”