#1
Sorry, but I'm loathe to consider anyone from NYPD an expert in anything, especially shoot. Okay okay, maybe donut eating and coffee laced with booze drinking. He also makes no mention of the fact that the bullets likely passed through several people and when firing at a packed mass like he was, missing is going to be pretty hard.
#4
Similar thing happened in the Aurora, CO theater shooting. All the initial reports had multiple shooters, which made sense because otherwise why didn't people just run out the exits? And the death toll in Orlando is hard to credit to just one guy.
#5
The off duty policeman hired as a security guard exchanged fire with Mr. Mateen, as did the first police officers to arrive on the scene. This is separate from any possible additional bad guys.
#6
People didn't run out the exits because one 'hero' (if he is to be believed) blocked the door thinking he was keeping the killer inside and ignored the pounding of everyone trying to get out.
That and the natural instinct is to get down and hide which is suicidal in such situations when you should literally fight or flight depending upon your proximity to the shooter.
[NYDAILYNEWS] The gun debate is also a gender war. Gertie Kuntzman doesn't know when to stop.
In all my years in journalism — coming up on 30 (thanks) — I have never received so much angry mail as I did after yesterday's story, "What is it like to fire an AR-15? It's horrifying, menacing and very very loud." Maybe you did something egregious?
I don't mind spirited debate, but many correspondents told me that even expressing an opinion about today's high-powered weaponry is off-limits to those of us who don't own such guns. It isn't off limits, because you managed to get your opinion published in a nationwide forum. I don't have an opinion about ladies' feminine hygiene products, either. I know approximately as much about them as Gertie knows about guns.
To reiterate, the goal of the story was simply to share with readers my experience of firing an AR-15, which very few of them have done. The ones who did know something about firing an AR-15 or any other gun were laughing, sneering, cursing, or whacking their foreheads, assuming they read further than the first paragraph or so,
I found the sheer power of the weapon horrifying. It's a gun. Not even a particularly powerful gun, though powerful enough if you know how to use it.
I found the noise deafening and anxiety provoking. I was frightened by its potential for rapid, catastrophic, Orlando-like carnage with similar weaponry. Using an AR-15 made me irritable and jittery for hours afterwards. You're saying you worked yourself into a hissy fit at the very thought of it? You went and rented a gun and expected to be scared pissless so you were?
To me, it felt like a bazooka. A bazooka was a big old tube thingy you held over your shoulder and used to shoot a rocket at a tank. An AR-15 is a rifle, referred to generically as a "gun," which is properly an artillery piece or that big long thing sticking out of the front of a tank. The rifle weighs about 6.5 pounds, which is about the same as my little Marlin .22. Or it's a brand of bubblegum. My guess is that Gershman has never been within 10 miles of a recoilless rifle or rocket launcher. He has no experience to speak of in that regard, so why make the simile? And more importantly, why stick to it?
"Kuntzman is an outright liar," wrote one emailer. "Nice try with an extremely stupid article which only appealed to girly boys and women of NYC and like the sheeple they are probably believed the lies." (Other writers informed me that the "lie" is that guns are bad. For the record: I never said they were.) A lot you didn't say was implicit in your opinion. But Gertie did imply that the AR-15 has an autogettem mode. It looks like an M-16, and in fact it's the immediate ancestor to the M-16, but it lacks a full auto capability. You'd have to rebuild the thing to put it in. You're expecting Gertie to know something (anything) about what he is writing. Any good member of the MSM ([cough] Krugman [cough]) can demonstrate that isn't so. But the owner of the gun store (if in fact Gertie went to the gun store) could have shown and told him in about three seconds that the AR-15 is a single-shot, semi-automatic rifle that can't do full-auto or 3-round bursts. That would assume Gertie was told before the gun sounds deafened him and the blast blinded him...
I certainly received many many emails from gun owners who legitimately quibbled with some of my conclusions. But the majority of email senders trained their laser sights on my masculinity — often in graphic terms that would sound more appropriate in a magazine about erectile dysfunction or an ad for Depends. Maybe he should reread what he wrote? It was pretty bad. He did everything but stick the tip of his finger in his mouth and utter "tee-hee!"
"Hey there Cupcake!" wrote Gary Haney. "I have never subscribed to the idea of 'gender confusion,' but after reading your article on the AR-15, I'm a believer because there is no way you and I are the same gender. You should surrender your testicles to the Department of Girlymen. I'm not sure where it's located, but your girlfriend Barack does!" I don't know if I'd go so far as to call Gertie a girl. I know girls who probably had to change their underwear from laughing too hard at this sniveler.
Others sent me videos of 7-, 10- and 12-year old girls firing the same weapon I fired — except these kids were smiling. They didn't show up expecting it to mow down a roomful of people without anyone pressing the trigger. So when you lack the steely fortitude and self-control of a seven year old girl, the word "girlyman" is more polite than coming right out and calling you a pencildick.
And I wear it as a point of personal pride that conservative darling Erick Erickson posted a story on The Resurgent with the headline, "My 10 Year Old Daughter Is Tougher Than Gersh Kuntzman, Author of the Stupidest Thing on the Internet Today." I've got a seven year old granddaughter that could probably have handled the gun and the situation better than Gertie. "You f--king pussy," wrote Sam Markota. "If you have a man card turn it in immediately. You might be better served writing about feminine hygiene products!!!" Gertie may know more about them than us men with whiskers do.
"Your father must have left you to be raised by your mother or he was a sissy like you," added SargentMike77. Sargent Mike misspelled sergeant. I ain't impressed with him, either.
And one of my favorites, thanks to its pithy manner of linking my affliction to another right wing obsession: "Maybe you can get some balls through Obamacare!" wrote Adam Prolo. Probably you couldn't. If you could, it'd cost you an arm and a leg, so then where would you be? Lop-sided and scrotum heavy, that's where. Easier to eat Wheaties for breakfast and beefsteak for dinner, retire from journalism after thirty years, and go to O-o-o-oklahoma,
where the wind comes sweeping down the plain
And the wavin' wheat can sure smell sweet
When the wind comes right behind the rain
Dunno. He'd prolly have a coronary seeing all the NRA and USMC stickers on all the pickup trucks and SUVs. He'd be unhappy here, I would think.
And that's just the printable stuff. I wasn't done singing yet!
To summarize, this line of argument suggests that I'm not a real man because I am frightened by the awesome power of an AR-15, which, despite however you willfully misread my story, can discharge dozens of rounds in mere seconds. ... assuming you pull the trigger many times in mere seconds. If you're actually aiming you shouldn't be squeezing (not pulling, dammit!) the trigger that fast. But, yeah, that does kinda sum it up. It can't. You didn't bother learning about the AR and as it turns out, you lied about the gun shop owner and what he said. Yes, this weapon scared the crap out of me. Which is why people make fun of you, dumbass.
And it should scare the crap out of all of you, too. It is a tool. A relatively good one, though if you want to buy me a present I'd rather have a Kimber. My next build is going to be an AR-10 pattern semiautomatic, the recoil of which will make this guy break down in tears. You know, so rule .308 can be applied when the time comes.
An AR-15 is a weapon of mass destruction, a tool that should only be in the hands of our soldiers and cops, as Rep. Seth Moulton wrote in the Daily News on Tuesday. "Weapons of mass destruction" are chemical, nuclear, and bacteriological. Equating a rifle than can kill four dozen with an atomic bomb that can snuff 100,000 is simply hysteria. It does not imply thought.
I don't think there's anything unmanly about pointing out this fact. But the majority of the rest of us non-Manhattan dwellers do. That's not a fact. It is an invitation to tyrants, big and small, to steal and murder, so that they can gain a monopoly of violence. Besides, if masculinity is defined by the power to commit violence on a wide scale, I proudly choose femininity. We noticed. I think that's one of the key points of departure for most of us...
At one time, “being a man” meant standing up for what you believe in — and against injustice. By that definition, we need more real men in power taking on bullies like the NRA, which seeks to bolster the Second Amendment by shutting down opponents’ right to the First. We can’t even debate guns in this country, thanks to the gun lobby. You can't stand against real injustice if you are not armed, and you can't claim to be against injustice if your opinion means you favor arming those who would commit injustices. "Global warming is real! Burn the heretics!"
"The word 'Trump' is written on the sidewalk in chalk! I need my safe space!"
Being a man means taking it when things are tough, overcoming the bad and sharing the good, kinda like those guys do in the movies, but consistently. Actual men grew up hearing the words "sticks and stones can break my bones but words will never hurt me" and believing them. Actual men do what they've got to do. Often they drink beer or whiskey, know how to use guns, swear, and all that sort of thing, though it's not a requirement. My email and Internet trolls won't believe me, but I support the Second Amendment. You're right. I don't. Believe you, that is.
I sincerely do believe that the Bill of Rights protects Americans' right to bear arms, albeit under very strict regulations — the "well-regulated militia" part of the sacred text. So that merely implies the government's right to draft you? Then you do not support the 2nd Amendment. You prefer the state have a monopoly of violence, which it will maintain in place of your rights. The Right to Keep and Bear Arms is first and foremost an individual right, but you would rather the state regulate guns to the point where it and only it can deliver violence for its own purposes The idea that an individual has the Gawd given right to keep his own weapon for use against tyrants big and small, doesn't even enter into the calculation with the state regulating the possession of firearms.
And I even agree with one letter writer who pointed out that hammers can kill people, too, but we don't ban them. Hammers and guns are both tools, of different trades, but both are beloved by hobbyists and skilled amateurs.
But what if a weapons manufacturer could fashion a handgun that would fire a nuclear blast — an atomic version of an AR-15, if you will. It would look like a gun, but it could kill thousands instead of dozens. Like a rifle, it's one of many arms that we are allowed to keep and bear. But would we really stand idly by as people buy a nuclear gun in the name of the Second Amendment? It's a really stoopid example because it wouldn't be available to the citizenry, any more than fully automatic weapons are. Less, in fact, but that's a real scary frowny face on the strawman. "It's just a gun," you might say. "It's my right. Trade in your man-card, you wimp." He's down to drooling and spitting now.
Yes, I'm a wimp. Good of you to admit what everybody else noticed right off.
I simpered because my experience with the AR-15 bruised me, body and spirit. Go to your safe space. You may need grief counseling. Don't look down because there might be something written on the sidewalk.
But there's nothing unmanly about reminding my readers that mass murder is much easier to commit with a semi-automatic killing machine than it is with a hammer. It's also easier to commit with a scythe.
If that makes me a girl, well, maybe we should have a girl running the country. Victoria Woodhull, all is forgiven! It should be noted that Gershman failed to mention in either of his screeds the fact that New York has some of the most draconian gun laws in the nation, and that the registration requirement in New York for the AR style of rifle was mainly ignored, to the tune of five percent registered total. That's in the area of statistical noise. Gershman also fails to note that universal background checks, which are the law in New York are the most likely reason why he and his crew were forced to go out of state to talk about ARs. Gertie also knows that if we get to the point in this country where we have universal registration and "may issue" just for basic ownership, you and I will never be able to convince the local law enforcement officer that we need a gun, whereas he, his bosses, and their bodyguards will have guns any time they wish. Oh, and the government too, of course.
#1
I was wondering why he mentioned only email responses and not my phone call. I called the paper and asked for him and he answered to my surprise.
I did not discuss or give him time to say one word, instead I lit into him with at least 8 explicatives without really letting him know the topic said explicatives, and then hung up. I see from the link this article was written one day before I rung his number.
#4
And I wear it as a point of personal pride that conservative darling Erick Erickson posted a story on The Resurgent with the headline, "My 10 Year Old Daughter Is Tougher Than Gersh Kuntzman, Author of the Stupidest Thing on the Internet Today."
Being a hysterical, emotionally fragile sissy is nothing to be proud of; that pride marks you as a seriously defective human being.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
06/17/2016 7:27 Comments ||
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#5
An AR-15 is a weapon of mass destruction,
Nukes, chemical, and bio weapons are weapons of mass destruction sunshine. BTW, you and yours have obviously Memory Holed 9/11 when talking civilian casualties which is a major achievement in cognitive discordance for someone living in the NYC area.
#7
He claims that people criticizing him are interfering with his 1st Amendment rights.
No, moron. The 1st Amendment just says that the GOVERNMENT can't put you in jail for saying something. It doesn't prevent people from responding and calling you out as the puss that you are.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
06/17/2016 9:35 Comments ||
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#8
I believe he wrote the article before he'd been to a gunshop and then when the news cycle became favorable he dropped into a gunshop to sprinkle names upon his article for authenticity (note the gunshop claims he totally misrepresented them).
I also suspect this latest article was pre-written as well because as a good lefty he knew he'd get a hostile response. Just write about how the cavemen attacked his opinions and sprinkle in a few facts.
I also think it's hysterical that he compared the AR-15 to a bazooka. As if he's ever fired a bazooka. More likely the Hollywood sound file version of a bazooka.
How does he thing I feel when people call me racist because I want a secure border? How about when people call me a Nazi because I support Trump? Dude (or should I say dudette?), the tables are turned. Deal with it like a man instead of a whining little bitch.
#12
Dear Burgers, a trim memorandum
Regarding Gersh Kuntzman's addendum:
Please, natch, treat him cruelly,
But don't wax so bluely!
Yours truly, A Lady's Pudendum.
#13
Dear Mr? Kuntzman,
Please go back to that gun store and fire one rifle shot and one pistol shot for me at my expense. First shoot a 458 Winchester bolt action rifle. Be sure to hold it about 2 inches away from your shoulder so it doesn't hit your shoulder to hard. Then try a 50 caliber Smith and Wesson pistol with a Cor-Bon heavy hunting load. Be sure and use two hands to hold it so it is centered on your face.
Please send pictures when you are done.
#15
Leave him alone! Snowflakes are a special and protected class...
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
06/17/2016 16:29 Comments ||
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#16
Just about every female who has ever gone through military basic training is laughing their a** off at this hapless wuss.
I know that my daughter - the two-hitch USMC veteran is.
Author Larry Correia at Monster Hunter Nation is also. Link here.
#18
I think he also just penned something about the toddler who was attacked by the alligator; I can't remember exactly or where I found it and am out of time, but it was absfuknlutely ridiculous, especially in light of these two articles.
[DONSURBER.BLOGSPOT] For the second time in two months, Jeffrey Goldberg of Atlantic Monthly has tried to explain the Obama Doctrine.
The trouble is, the Obama Doctrine does not exist. It is a fairy tale, a unicorn, that homework assignment that the dog ate. President B.O. has no foreign policy other than outsourcing it to the next president. He sees no reason to expend any political capital whatsoever on foreign policy and given how the Democratic Party trashed his predecessor, I can see Obama's point.
Why be punished for doing the right thing?
However, by candlelight every wench is handsome... Obama's shirking of his duties is bearing its rotted fruit a few years early. Two attacks by Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... turbans in recent months -- including Sunday's attack in Orlando, the largest slaughter of homosexuals in the Western World -- forced him to answer for his political cowardice.
He got angry -- furious -- at Donald Trump for being right about terrorism. Under Obama, the nation is now less protected against terrorism than any time since 9/11.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/17/2016 00:00 ||
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Link ||
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#1
O is making the U.S. a radical islam-friendly place with unrestricted immigration, open borders, by eliminating any mention of radicsl islam in the Feral Govmint, and by doing little to prevent horrific attacks.
#3
The crazier things get the worse it'll be when the pendulum swings back again. I think Black Lives Matter and CAIR and others seem to have forget that lesson.
#4
His lashing out at Trump shows more about his loyalty to Islam and his Trotsky agenda. He was really hurt that Islam attacked "His" constituents. He feels betrayed by his faith, that moment when a useful idiot realizes he is a tool. His lashing out is like beating the dog because his wife is being a bitch.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
06/17/2016 13:33 Comments ||
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#5
Directing the media emphasis to the hazards of importing muslims clouds the focus of the narrative about NAFTA and the porous southern border. The emotional impact on 100 families cannot (nor should) be balanced against the devastating national long term economic impact of unemployment but the attention of the masses has been shifted to problems seemingly more immediate.
Ergo, kicking the wife's dog.
[NYPOST] If it is true that the best defense is a good offense, President B.O. should be celebrating in the end zone now. Obviously furious over criticism that his anti-terror policies are weak and that the Orlando slaughter proves it, he went on a televised tirade to let America know he’s mad as hell and not going to take it anymore.
He laid waste to a field of straw men, cable-TV pundits and the always-evil "partisan rhetoric," by which he means anyone who disagrees with him. It was a striking display of personal anger and pent-up grievances -- and a total failure of leadership during a national crisis.
It also, inadvertently, captured why Donald Trump was able to brawl his way to the GOP nomination. All his nice Republican rivals couldn’t stir voters because they never knew how to rattle Obama the way Trump is doing. The president didn’t mention Trump yesterday, but the whole speech was nothing but a desperate and incoherent reaction to Trumpism.
As such, it was a huge moment in the general-election campaign, even though it comes before the nominees are formally crowned. For one thing, it showed that Obama’s plan to campaign against Trump as if he is running for his own third term won’t be a cakewalk for the president or his legacy.
For another, the Obama-Trump war means Hillary Clinton ... sometimes described as The Heroine of Tuzla and at other times as Mrs. Bill, never as Another Edward Stettinius, Jr. ... could be overshadowed in what was supposed to be her campaign for vindication. Throw in her husband and the stage is going to get crowded with alpha males competing for attention.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/17/2016 00:00 ||
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#1
I wouldn't call the empty suit an alpha male...
#2
"It also, inadvertently, captured why Donald Trump was able to brawl his way to the GOP nomination. All his nice Republican rivals couldn’t stir voters because they never knew how to rattle Obama the way Trump is doing."
I have to disagree with Goodwin here. Although Trump's ability to get under Obama's thin skin was certainly an influential factor for some, I think a more important reason was his blunt, crude, plain-spoken and emphatic condemnation of Obama and his policies in contrast to other candidates' more cautious, "civil" criticisms. Trump's willingness to "tell it like it is", without mincing words, IMO gave him a huge advantage.
Ronald Reagan won the 1980 election in a landslide in large part because Americans were sick and tired of hearing the usual "mush from the wimp", Jimmy Carter, and Reagan provided a much-needed antidote. I suspect much the same thing has been at work with Trump against his primary-season opponents.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
06/17/2016 7:19 Comments ||
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#3
Wow - Obama managed to hit most of the seven deadly sins of narcissism in one small tantrum.
1. Entitlement: Narcissists hold unreasonable expectations of particularly favorable treatment and automatic compliance because they consider themselves special. Defiance of their will is a narcissistic injury that can trigger narcissistic rage.
2. Arrogance: A narcissist who is feeling deflated may re-inflate by diminishing, debasing, or degrading somebody else. Bingo.
3. Envy: A narcissist may secure a sense of superiority in the face of another person's ability by using contempt to minimize the other person. Double bingo.
4. Exploitation: He has no regard or true feelings for the victims of this current death and destruction - this tragedy is merely a vehicle to push his agenda.
5. Magical thinking: Use of distortion and illusion via construction of constant straw man arguments (the only argument he can win) in order to attempt to project and dump shame onto others.
6. Bad boundaries: Others either exist to meet their needs or may as well not exist at all.
7. Shamelessness. 'Nuff said.
#4
Don't fall for the hype.
Personalized crises, Trump, the Wall, muslims, empty suits, fat pantsuited granny crooks, are all manufactured. Capturing and misdirecting voter energies is the plan.
#5
Entitlement: Narcissists hold unreasonable expectations of particularly favorable treatment and automatic compliance because they consider themselves special. Defiance of their will is a narcissistic injury that can trigger narcissistic rage.
[Federalist] In the wake of the Orlando terrorist attack, the deadliest strike on U.S. soil since 9/11, Democratic lawmakers and progressive activists have responded by attempting to limit access to firearms -- particularly the AR-15, which was incorrectly reported as the weapon the terrorist used to kill at least 49 people and injure another 53.
In a new video, former Navy SEAL Dom Raso explains why the AR-15, the most popular rifle in the country, gives Americans the best chance of surviving in an age of terror.
"The only way for us to stay free was by having whatever guns the bad guys have," he said. "This firearm gives average people the advantage they so desperately need and deserve to protect their life, liberty, and happiness."
#2
No, the AR-15 is not the best defense against terrorism. It is the best defense against a tyrannical government who oppresses our God given Liberty.
A well trained conceal-carry permit holder(s) with a good quality handgun is the best defense against terrorists.
Long piece about the 130,000 -- that number is right -- missiles held by Hezbollah. As the man says, you don't collect that many missiles if you aren't going to use them. Israel will be blamed, of course.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/17/2016 00:11 ||
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#1
Proper response is to nuke the shit out of launching sites and storage.
#2
South Lebanon aint that big. Surely the Isrealis can find enough to set their highly flammable propellant ablaze. Hizd is too stretched in Syria to seriously respond.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/17/2016 14:36 Comments ||
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#7
Pretty straightforward to examine 10 years of overheads for excavation, construction, utility upgrades and debris piles to localize the search (targeting).
#8
Pity Israel doesn't have a railgun. It would be a good way to destroy missiles in underground bunkers. With the PR bonus, it wouldn't cause much surface damage.
#9
phil_b is right. The area where these things can be launched from is about 300 square miles. FM-100-2.1 page 136 (https://fas.org/irp/doddir/army/fm100-2-1.pdf) says that a Russian 152mm howitzer battery can suppress a square mile with about 4000 rounds. The Israeli 155mm artillery is probably similar. So, with a million 155 rounds, Israel can cover the whole area. They have 900 of these howitzers that fire 2 rounds a minute sustained, so it would take about 12 hours to clear south Lebanon with just this one of many weapon systems available to the IDF.
If I were there, I would stock at least 14 million rounds to hedge against that contingency; so, I could begin every sunrise and every sunset with a complete barrage for a week, which would cost less than $5 billion. (iron dome has cost about the same amount, and buying both over the course of a decade would be wise.)
h/t Instapundit
Before the Battle of Chaeronea (338 BC), where Philip II of Macedon prevailed over a common Greek alliance, the city-states had been weakened by years of social and economic turmoil. To read the classical speeches in the Athenian assembly is to learn of the democracy’s constant struggles with declining revenues, insolvency, and expanding entitlements. Rome between the First Triumvirate (59 BC) and the ascension of Caesar Augustus’s autocracy (27 BC) was mostly defined by gang violence, chaos, and civil war, the common theme being a loss of trust in republican values. Russia was in a revolutionary spiral for nearly twenty years between 1905 and the final victory of the Bolsheviks in 1922, ending up with a cure worse than the disease. And Europe between 1930 and 1939 saw most of its democracies erode as fascists and communists gained power--eventually leading to the greater disaster of the outbreak of World War II.
The United States has seen periods of near fatal internal chaos--in the late 1850s leading up to the carnage of the Civil War, during the decade of the Great Depression between 1929 and 1939, and in the chaotic 1960s. Something similar is starting to plague America today on a variety of political, economic, social, and cultural fronts.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[NYDAILYNEWS] The gun debate is also a gender war.
"You f--king pussy," wrote Sam Markota. "If you have a man card turn it in immediately. You might be better served writing about feminine hygiene products!!!"
Yes, this weapon scared the crap out of me. 
Besides, if masculinity is defined by the power to commit violence on a wide scale, I proudly choose femininity. 
My email and Internet trolls won't believe me, but I support the Second Amendment. 
"It's just a gun," you might say. "It's my right. Trade in your man-card, you wimp."
Hillary Clinton
