January 16, 2022

"I’m not what people assume that I am. I love the fact that I’m different, and maybe that makes me scary to some, but I don’t know, I’m not this gun-toting, right-wing extremist that they all think I am."

Sova was reminded that she was, quite literally, toting a gun at that moment, with a pistol strapped to her hip. 

She laughed. “But I’m not waving it around, you know what I mean,” she said. “This is a tool. It is to be an equalizer in any bad situation. I’m not here to intimidate people.”...Two hours before she was to be sworn in at her first school board meeting, Sova was in mud-spattered boots feeding farm animals on her family’s 12-acre compound, which is nestled in the woods behind a tall metal gate with signs warning that trespassers would be shot. Sova said she would change her shoes and try not to cuss, but that otherwise, she intended to be 100 percent herself on the board....
Sova is an accidental politician, recruited as a last-minute replacement when another candidate, a local right-wing activist, realized that his address was just outside the district. She said she never previously sought any public role — “Oh sweet baby Jesus, no!” — and didn’t think she had much of a chance at winning. 

Sova saw running mainly as a way to register conservative discontent on the issues of the moment: mask mandates, diversity and inclusion efforts, sex education lessons. Before filing, Sova said, she had family check-ins with her husband, a Slovakian immigrant whose family’s escape from communist rule influenced her politics, and their three children, ages 16, 15 and 10. The kids have been home-schooled since 2014. 
“It was a big decision for us,” Sova said of entering the race. “I knew right now, in this era, that I was going to get a lot of crap.” And she did, mostly related to her Three Percenter activity, which Sova brushes off as being “in the country doing country things.” 
She said she doesn’t take part in protests at the state capitol. She joined because she shares the group’s “constitutionalist” stances and wanted to learn survival skills like canning and butchering. “We have bonfires over here where the music is loud and the neighbors don’t care. Where we’ve got a big fire going, kids jumping on the trampoline and everybody’s running around and having fun,” Sova said. “That, to us, is Three Percent.” 
Sova’s critics reject that idealized image, especially after seeing Three Percenter flags among the rioters at the U.S. Capitol....

ADDED: I had to go over to Wikipedia to answer my question 3% of what? 

The group's name derives from the erroneous claim that "the active forces in the field against the King's tyranny never amounted to more than 3% of the colonists" during the American Revolution.

Also of interest: 

On February 21, 2021, their leadership dissolved the American national group in response to the 2021 United States Capitol attack, condemning the violence. Other Three Percenters remain as independent local groups.

138 comments:

Joe Smith said...

Good for her...more women should carry guns.

Dude1394 said...

Far-right, far-right, the propaganda continues. When the media puts far-left on the front of just about every democrat, then we will actually have some fairness in news.

Until then the media is a democrat partner.

Interested Bystander said...

Progressives with the proper credentials live on 12 acre estates. Gun totin' right-wingers live on 12 acre compounds.

Then there's claims that 3 Percent(ers) flags were seen at the Capitol "insurrection." Ugh. Why can't a WaPo reporter just tell the story without injecting all her own biases.

Achilles said...

Ann reads the Wapo because it trashes people like this.

Scot said...

I tried to follow the story to collect some interesting quotes, but quit about half. Is nothing more than a political screed contra The Enemy. Not a news story. Want evidence re the Liberal News? Here it is, in WaPo. Disgraceful.

CarolynnS said...

Ann reads the Washington Post so we don’t have to read or subscribe.

effinayright said...

BLM and Antifa might think twice before they riot and burn wypeepos shit down, if they know
there will be Pistol Packin' Mamas in their midst.

Achilles said...

Sova was reminded that she was, quite literally, toting a gun at that moment, with a pistol strapped to her hip.

She laughed. “But I’m not waving it around, you know what I mean,” she said. “This is a tool. It is to be an equalizer in any bad situation. I’m not here to intimidate people.”



That is the problem.

Democrats want kneelers and sheep.

This woman represents freedom. They hate freedom.

Ann Althouse said...

I read WaPo because somebody gave me a gift subscription!

And I get bloggable stuff every day.

Now, in this case, I went to the end of the article to get what I thought was bloggable. The entire top of the article was designed to make Sova seem untouchably toxic, so that triggered me to look for what they tucked away at the bottom.

exhelodrvr1 said...

2.5 M in the colonies in 1776
max of 48K in the field in the regular Army (at one time)
militias totaled another 145K, estimate max of 15-30K at any one time

3% was about the max size of the forces relative to the population, and most of the time it was less than that.

So that is NOT an erroneous claim.

Iman said...

Deal with it, Beltway Bitches…

Ann Althouse said...

"So that is NOT an erroneous claim."

Wikipedia has 2 links to support its statement. One is to the ADL, which says:

"Three Percenters (also known as 3%ers, III%ers, and Threepers) are anti-government extremists who are part of the militia movement. They compare their hostility to the federal government with the opposition of American patriots to the British during the American Revolution. The term itself is a reference to a false belief that the number of Americans who fought against the British during the Revolutionary War amounted to only three percent of the population at the time (historians say that percentage was actually far higher)."

That links to "More Americans Fought in the American Revolution Than We Thought" (Observer)(and that's also the second link at Wikipedia):

"It turns out that the 80,000 number bandied about was the number of pension files and bounty-land warrant applications. It doesn’t include all in the Continental Army, militia or other units, or those who served but didn’t file for a pension or bounty-land warrant application.

"Historian John Ferling finds that the Continental Army size was actually 100,000, not counting the militia. “Probably twice that number soldiered as militiamen, for the most part defending the home front, functioning as a police force, and occasionally engaging in enemy surveillance” in addition to supplementing the Continental Army for stretches.

"John K. Robertson looks at this very issue of militia size in the Journal of the American Revolution in 2016. In his article “Decoding Connecticut Militia 1739-1783,” Robertson finds that in May of 1774, the Connecticut state legislature created the 17th and 18th Regiments. At the time, the state’s population was 191,392 white males, females and children (no word on the non-white population was listed). Of these, 26,260 were in the militia, which meant 13 percent of the population...."

Achilles said...

So is the WaPo trashy?

Or is that only a label for other outlets?

gilbar said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Richard Dillman said...

The horror, oh the horror! A deplorable was elected to a school board! I think she will do just fine. There are many people like her in
Washington and Oregon. They are just not in Seattle and Portland.

Owen said...

"The race was basically sabotaged by national narrative," says Cole. Well, yes. But in fact I think the "national narrative" is another way of saying "parents everywhere are waking up to the same pathological issues of curricula infected with racist/sexist agendas and school mismanagement now grown so complacent, inept and overbearing that it can no longer be ignored. See Loudoun County, Virginia as a harbinger of the reckoning now underway."

The long form is tedious to write, so everybody can just say "national narrative." But that's what going on.

gilbar said...

i just got done compiling data, and i see exhelodrvr beat me to it
but, here are my links
https://247wallst.com/economy/2019/07/04/in-july-1776-2-5-million-people-lived-in-the-thirteen-colonies-and/

The peak strength for a year was at 89,000 in 1776, and half of those were militiamen.

89,000/2,500,000=0.0356 or 3 (And A Half) percent [INCLUDING MILITAS]
if we talk about regular army.... 89,000/2= 44,500
44,500/2,500,000=0.0178 or LESS THAN TWO PERCENT

as Barbie says, Math is Hard!

Robert Cook said...

That so many people feel they need to openly carry sidearms wherever they go to "equalize bad situations" tells much about the appalling current state of our society.

exhelodrvr1 said...

Ann,
What you are quoting in your 11:31 comment refers to the total number who served in the American Army throughout the war. The "3%" refers to the max at any one point in time. i.e. "the active forces in the field" (per your quote in the original post.)

Owen said...

Interesting discussion here of the "3%" thing (about which I know nothing, sorry). If the colonies had 2.5 million people, how many were males of military age (say 16 to 50)? Let's suppose the 2.5 million were 50-50 male/female, so you had a pool of 1.25 million males, and they were evenly distributed by age from 0 to say 60, about 22,000 of each year of age, so in the military age range of 35 years you'd have about 770,000. Some of whom were unfit, and some of whom served briefly, so your effective pool would be considerably less. I imagine if you took more than about 10% of that 770,000, you'd have crippled your agricultural and economic base, and you could not long field a working army.

So "3%" may be more like "10% of the theoretical potential pool, and pretty much the max we could have gotten."

wild chicken said...

Open carrying is too provocative imo. And it gives Bad Guy time to plan how to snatch it away.

Sadly, open totin' GOP Gun Chick has become a common type. Nothing original here.

Get over yourself, woman. And hide the pistol.

gilbar said...

The Article that wiki (and Althouse )cite, itself refers to THIS page
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/myths-of-the-american-revolution-10941835/
where "A noted historian debunks the conventional wisdom about America’s War of Independence"

in THAT article, John Ferling states (WITH OUT EVIDENCE)
Couldn’t two million free colonists muster a force of 100,000 or so citizen-soldiers
and then
Some 100,000 men served in the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War.

These are The ONLY times in the article that Ferling talks about army strength.
The first time, to say that 'britain knew what they were getting into.
The second, to say that the militia was not useless.
NEITHER TIME does Ferling give ANY reason to think that these are not imaginary numbers

Interestingly I found that "100,000" number, NOWHERE ELSE. Can you?

Josephbleau said...

I have no problem with her attitude, but I would be reluctant to vote for a school board candidate who has bones tattooed on her hand, it’s just a quirk I have.

Owen said...

Wild chicken @ 11:50: Agree, open carry would be needlessly provocative to the bedwetters (and those who want Scary Guns to be their issue). And it just gives information to the wrong people. One of the points of concealed carry is strategic uncertainty. If the bad guys don't know who is carrying, they might just make less trouble. See also "Air Marshals."

Josephbleau said...

“Open carrying is too provocative imo. And it gives Bad Guy time to plan how to snatch it away.”

On the other hand open carry makes attackers go after other people who are easier to rape and kill.

narciso said...




yes lock her up

https://www.voteashleysova.com/

Yancey Ward said...

Did the commenters at WaPo, or the article's writer criticize her for running for the school board even though none of her children attend the local schools?

rehajm said...

This is a tool. It is to be an equalizer in any bad situation. I’m not here to intimidate people.”

Some may do it to intimidate but usually the decision to carry is to deter. The rest is shit thinking- in a bad situation your goal shouldn’t be to equalize but to surprise with overwhelming force so the bad situation ends quickly in your favor.

Michael K said...

Robert Cook said...

That so many people feel they need to openly carry sidearms wherever they go to "equalize bad situations" tells much about the appalling current state of our society.


Fortunately, "the appalling current state of our society" is mostly in Democrat cities where idiot voters defund police and elect Soros DAs. Rural Washington is pretty safe.

Limited blogger said...

She has a Trump bobble head doll in her shopping cart in one of the article's photos.

This can not stand!

MadTownGuy said...

Ann Althouse said...

"Now, in this case, I went to the end of the article to get what I thought was bloggable. The entire top of the article was designed to make Sova seem untouchably toxic, so that triggered me to look for what they tucked away at the bottom."

That's been my experience with Associated Press articles. You have to get way past the headline and first few paragraphs to get all the facts.

rehajm said...

That so many people feel they need to openly carry sidearms wherever they go to "equalize bad situations" tells much about the appalling current state of our society.

Spoken like one if those ugly old farts that shuffle around the upper west side…

rehajm said...

On the other hand open carry makes attackers go after other people who are easier to rape and kill.

Concealed carry means bad guys have to guess.

madAsHell said...

Eatonville?? It's not really a bedroom community outside Seattle. It's well outside the Seattle bubble. It's half-way to Mt. Rainier.

Eatonville is all lumber, liquor, and loaded firearms. Hell, I'd be an outsider in Eatonville, and I speak the language......fluently.

madAsHell said...

That so many people feel they need to openly carry sidearms wherever they go to "equalize bad situations" tells much about the appalling current state of our society.


An armed society is a very polite, and civil society.

BUMBLE BEE said...

Open carry for her may just be the contra-pussy hat. I wouldn't recommend trying to "take the gun away" from a person carrying openly. See also Kyle Rittenhouse. He went 3 for 3.

mikee said...

Althouse reads the WaPo the same way pre-1989 Russians read Pravda. Go to the end of the article to find the story that is misrepresented up front. Here's another hint about how to read Pravda: what does the story leave out, that is obvious but contradicts the narrative presented? Prqavda readers read not the printed words, but what was between the lines, unwritten.

This story doesn't spend much time on the failed school system, run for decades by teachers' union supporters and Democrat apparatchniks, does it? Onemight think that a mess so very bad that an "extremist" non-politician, non-educrat candidate won election is a story worth covering, no? Well, to WaPo, no.

BUMBLE BEE said...

Many of the urban blacks I worked with back in the day carried unlicensed and sent their Baptist kids to parochial schools. Wonder why?

Barbara said...

I love that the new school board member homeschools her kids.

Tim said...

Just to put that into perspective, if 3% of the population of the US today were to be "in the field", which would represent the combat ready portion of our armed forces, that would amount to 10,000,000 or 1000 divisions?! Pretty good turnout I think.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

So, if you read the entire story you find out that while the anonymous democrat couple were yelled at by someone from a distance, the "far right" candidate who won against the incumbent is the one who appears to be the recipient of intimidation tactics.

Also, if someone with tattoos on their neck and who home schools their kids can beat the nice, normal woman who was already on the school board, you might want to think about just how out of skew the "normal" person's views are from the community's regarding school curriculum.

And finally, considering that 11% of the US population fought in WW2, with a universal and total mobilization, makes the claim that 10% fought in the Revolutionary War pretty risible.

Leland said...

WaPo is now covering school board elections in rural Washington (looks at notes) State? I guess when you set out to seek an extremist to prove a point you must really go to extremes to find them. And it is primarily asserted by the reported that they found one.

Bilwick said...

She says "gun-toting right-wing extremist" like that's a bad thing.

narciso said...

nearby city was burning for the better part of a year, in fact wasn't there a lawless zone, if you stand in the middle of the road, you have a dead armadillo,

narciso said...

the local fishwrap was on a crusade against moms for liberty, the nerve of them

J Severs said...

"recruited as a last-minute replacement" and she still won. I think that shows the prevalent thinking in the school district. Also, does the WP think this is another case of Democracy Dying, or not? I suspect the former.

Narayanan said...

Prqavda readers read not the printed words, but what was between the lines, unwritten.
---------
so this blog will be sub-rosetta text for future historians

Mike Yancey said...

"Far Right-Wing Extremist" - people who believe things that were commonly believed from only only 3 to 10 years ago.

narciso said...

in the land of blind isley, this happens, eureka

Josephbleau said...

“WaPo is now covering school board elections in rural Washington”

Good point, the Gosset trial was notably just local news and was not covered nationally.

Jim at said...

I am quite familiar with Eatonville. Wearing a gun on your hip is expected.

Jupiter said...

"Wikipedia has 2 links to support its statement. One is to the ADL ..."

What, the SPLC wasn't available?

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

The more I hear about "equity and inclusion" the more confused I get.

Woke Inclusion is really Exclusion.

This is not what MLK stood and fought for.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...


“Blogger Robert Cook said...
That so many people feel they need to openly carry sidearms wherever they go to "equalize bad situations" tells much about the appalling current state of our society.”

Not sure who you’re blaming for that appalling state, Bob, but your statement is certainly correct. The stampede for guns and ammunition over the last couple of years is certainly an eloquent comment on how people view the competence of the Establishment. As with most things since 2020, the conservative in me is appalled but the libertarian in me is delighted.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Coincidently, this morning I heard Andrew Sullivan's podcast with Christopher Rufo on "CRT In Schools". Andrew believes that "they" the woke ideologists, need to be opposed, but he's afraid of CRT being replaced with right wing ideology just as much as CRT. Andrew is ambivalent about using the tools available, such as electing people who might ban things, that might return to form. Rufo believes the risk of not trying outweighs the Marjorie Taylor Greene et al.

Link - It's worth a listen

Bobb said...

Wikipedia's reliance on the number of Connecticut militia counted by Robertson has nothing to do with troops in the field. Robertson, in the last paragraph of his article, states, "The militia is best regarded as a pool of manpower from which men were drawn, either by enlistment or draft, to serve the needs and obligations of the colony/state."

Critter said...

Not one mention of our "sacred democracy" in the article and how the election of this accidental politician is in the best tradition of American Democracy. Somehow it's not democracy when the left is not winning offices. They are SO predictable and pathetic. No arguments against her policies, just shock that she isn't one of them.

Critter said...

One other point. After 1/6/2021 it became known that the FBI was fielding infiltrators in the 3% groups to attempt to create another Michigan case etc. So the smart groups disbanded. This woman is who your taxpayer dollars are going to harass and surveil, while nary a glance at Antifa and BLM. Politics by another name and the FBI has taken sides.

Bill R said...

A lady, while dining in Crewe
Found an elephant wang in her stew
Said the waiter, don't shout
Or wave it about
Or the others will be wanting one too.


I dunno, seemed relevant, somehow.

Freder Frederson said...

An armed society is a very polite, and civil society.

Bullshit! Here is a nice recent incident of two law abiding gun owners getting into a gunfight over a minor traffic accident. One of them ended up dead.

Freder Frederson said...

Which goes to show you, even Prius owners in Florida are packing. Sure doesn't make me feel safer.

Lawrence Person said...

Everyone involved in pushing Critical Race Theory and Social Justice to schoolchildren needs to get pink slips.

Clean sweep.

Hard reboot.

No quarter.

Freder Frederson said...

And finally, considering that 11% of the US population fought in WW2, with a universal and total mobilization, makes the claim that 10% fought in the Revolutionary War pretty risible.

The U.S. didn't have universal and total mobilization, there were numerous exempt occupations (e.g., farmers and miners, although lots of both volunteered), we never drafted anyone under 18 or over 45, and physical standards were pretty strict. You want total mobilization, look at Russia or Germany.

Paul said...

Go Woke... go broke!

And FJB!

Freder Frederson said...

Everyone involved in pushing Critical Race Theory and Social Justice to schoolchildren needs to get pink slips.

So you don't really get that whole 1st amendment thing, do you? Especially when "schoolchildren" includes an age cohort of four or five to eighteen. Do you really believe high school students are incapable of evaluating what they are taught.

Freder Frederson said...

No quarter.

You know it really doesn't help your case when you use phrases that mean the illegal execution of surrendering or disarmed combatants.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

The U.S. didn't have universal and total mobilization, there were numerous exempt occupations (e.g., farmers and miners, although lots of both volunteered), we never drafted anyone under 18 or over 45, and physical standards were pretty strict. You want total mobilization, look at Russia or Germany.


My God, somebody just broke the pedantic meter.

Dr Weevil said...

You know it really doesn't help your case when you imply that teachers working for schools run by states and counties and cities and paid for by taxpayers can teach anything they want in their classes. That is not what the First Amendment means. With very limited exceptions, you can say what you want on Twitter or to your friends, or in newspapers, but if you're teaching that the earth is flat in Geography class or that one plus one equals whatever number you want it to be in Math class, you can be fired, should be fired, and very likely will fired. Since CRT is a racist fraud, you should be fired if you're teaching it in History class, and fired even quicker if you're teaching it in Geography or Math class. (Teaching about it: maybe, but only to older students.) I used to be amazed to read otherwise coherent people writing such nonsense about the First Amendment, but I've gotten used to it.

cubanbob said...

The WaPo should be doing in depth articles on why DC and the DC government are so effed up. keep it local.

Mason G said...

"You know it really doesn't help your case when you use phrases that mean the illegal execution of surrendering or disarmed combatants."

That phrase was used in the context of eliminating the National School Boards Association.

"That’s why the NSBA needs to be completely destroyed."

Either you knew that and deliberately misrepresented what Lawrence Person wrote, or you didn't bother to check the link Lawrence provided before getting your panties in a twist.

papper said...

People with children care about education. Who would have guessed.

Freder Frederson said...

Since CRT is a racist fraud, you should be fired if you're teaching it in History class

Just because you believe CRT is racist fraud, doesn't make it so. In fact, I'll bet you don't even know what CRT actually is.

Freder Frederson said...

That phrase was used in the context of eliminating the National School Boards Association.

Still means the fucking same thing. And he is citing his own fucking blog. So I don't see your point.

Freder Frederson said...

No quarter means killing all the enemy, even if they surrender. If you think it means something else you are wrong.

And no, that you want to kill a couple dozen people but now have extended that threat to thousands doesn't make a lick of difference.

Freder Frederson said...

but if you're teaching that the earth is flat in Geography class

How about not teaching evolution in biology (which is a cornerstone of biology)? Should a teacher be fired for that? Because a bunch of states have made it extremely difficult to teach evolution.

Dr Weevil said...

Poor FF doesn't understand how metaphors work. 'No quarter' has to mean literally killing one's enemies, but when he writes in the previous comment "his own fucking blog" he obviously does not mean that he or anyone else is literally having sexual relations with said blog, because it's an obvious fucking (in the non-sexual crude-expletive sense) metaphor. Duh! Of course, he also pretends that I don't know what CRT is, when he knows perfectly well that we all do: he's just doing a variation on the old "define your terms" infinite-regress pseudo-argument.

Of course, no one objects to teaching the facts of evolution in Biology class. Unfortunately, way too many high-school and college Biology teachers think it's their job to destroy students' religious beliefs by preaching a form of Lucretianism: hedonistic atheistic materialism. Evolution is in no way incompatible with belief in God or gods, and teachers should not try to imply that it is, as many do.

narciso said...

he's a party to the fraud, that was conjured up by pathological racist derrick bell and out right fantasists like kimberly crenshaw, it's a poison worse than a virus, because there is no therapeutic that can cure it,

Freder Frederson said...

Of course, no one objects to teaching the facts of evolution in Biology class. Unfortunately, way too many high-school and college Biology teachers think it's their job to destroy students' religious beliefs by preaching a form of Lucretianism: hedonistic atheistic materialism. Evolution is in no way incompatible with belief in God or gods, and teachers should not try to imply that it is, as many do.

This entire paragraph is bullshit. Many people object to the facts of evolution in biology class. Evolution is definitely incompatible with those who believe in biblical inerrancy (which of course is also incompatible with the belief in a spherical earth or heliocentric solar system).

NMObjectivist said...

Here’s a photo of Ashley Sova on her web site for her campaign. She looks nice.

https://www.voteashleysova.com

Mason G said...

Apologies to the blog owner for not logging in previously, and posting under the name "Unknown". On the plus side, nothing of importance was missed as the comment that was removed was made in response to an obvious idiot. I'll not be making that mistake again.

Dr Weevil said...

FF alleges that "biblical inerrancy" is "incompatible with the belief in a spherical earth". Demonstrably false. The Catholic Church reaffirmed Biblical inerrancy as recently as the Second Vatican Council. The greatest Catholic theologian, Thomas Aquinas, wrote as long ago as the 1260's: "Both an astronomer and a physical scientist may demonstrate the same conclusion, for instance that the earth is spherical; the first, however, works in a mathematical medium prescinding from material qualities, while for the second his medium is the observation material bodies through the senses." Note that he takes it for granted that the earth is spherical, that that can be known at least two different ways, and that his readers already know that.

And Aquinas didn't exactly squirrel it away where no one would read it: it's in the very first article of 3,125 in the Summa Theologica: Question 1a.1.1, "On what sort of teaching Christian theology is and what it covers". The standard edition of the Latin text with facing English translation and thorough notes by Gilbey fills 61 volumes. The quotation is from page 9 of the first volume, with the Latin on page 8.

There's a good even-handed account of the 1619 Project here: What the 1619 Project Means.

rehajm said...

Blogger Freder Frederson said...
No quarter means killing all the enemy, even if they surrender. If you think it means something else you are wrong.


No, you are not wrong

(If only there were some place people could look things up…)

Robert Cook said...

”Fortunately, "the appalling current state of our society" is mostly in Democrat cities where idiot voters defund police and elect Soros DAs. Rural Washington is pretty safe.”

You misunderstand me. I’m talking about the appalling state of mind of so many Americans, those who feel compelled to go out into public openly armed. The state of the nation is not so perilous that citizens need to be armed en masse.

Robert Cook said...

”Spoken like one if those ugly old farts that shuffle around the upper west side…“

Not any more…though I’ll always miss it.

Robert Cook said...

”An armed society is a very polite, and civil society.“

No, it’s a society with horrifying numbers of gun deaths each year, often accidental (toddlers finding guns and killings themselves or others in the home, homeowners gunning down family members or other innocents they mistake as intruders, domestic and public arguments that lead to anger-fueled shooting down of one party or parties by another, etc.).

Michael K said...

You misunderstand me. I’m talking about the appalling state of mind of so many Americans, those who feel compelled to go out into public openly armed. The state of the nation is not so perilous that citizens need to be armed en masse.

Nope, Cook. I count you as one of those idiots who vote in communists like Warren Wilhelm Jr. I suspect the first intelligent thing you've done is decamp to the free state of Florida, like AOC, another loony lefty.

Michael K said...

Many people object to the facts of evolution in biology class. Evolution is definitely incompatible with those who believe in biblical inerrancy (which of course is also incompatible with the belief in a spherical earth or heliocentric solar system).

Attention ! Straw man alert. My lefty daughter got excited a few years ago when some Texas school district approved teaching Biblical creation along with Evolution. I asked her if Evolution was more important than reading and math. Being intelligent, she agreed reading and math were more important. These are kids.

Dr Weevil said...

Oops! The editor of Aquinas is Gilby, not Gilbey. I must have been thinking of gin subconsciously.

Left Bank of the Charles said...

“Here is a nice recent incident of two law abiding gun owners getting into a gunfight over a minor traffic accident. One of them ended up dead.”

My reading of that story is that there was, at most, one law abiding gun owner involved in that incident.

Robert Cook said...

"Nope, Cook. I count you as one of those idiots who vote in communists like Warren Wilhelm Jr. I suspect the first intelligent thing you've done is decamp to the free state of Florida, like AOC, another loony lefty."

Nope, I left Florida for New York just shy of 41 years ago. I have not returned to the Sunshine State, though I still have family there. The thought makes me shudder.

Original Mike said...

"I’m talking about the appalling state of mind of so many Americans, those who feel compelled to go out into public openly armed."

I don't understand them. We have the police to apprehended offenders and DAs to keep the criminals from preying on the law-abiding.

Dr Weevil said...

People who assume all Prius drivers are lefties are idiots or bigots or both. I'm pretty right wing, at least by contemporary standards, and I drive a Prius. Of course, I never would have even considered buying one - way too expensive for what you get, so you really have to want to make some kind of statement to buy one yourself.

However, my mother gave me a 4-year-old already-paid-for Prius a week before she died. Should I have said "Screw you, Mom! Do I look like some asshole Prius driver?" I didn't: I thanked her very heartily. It's a great car as long as someone else pays for it: excellent mileage, very reliable, with a convenient hatchback for hauling even fairly large piece of furniture.

(Whether I'm 'packing heat' when I drive it is another question, whose answer is no one's business but mine.)

Judging people, and especially assuming their politics, by the model of car they drive, or the genre of music they listen to, or their profession, or a hundred other non-political things, is bigoted and stupid. Judge their ideas.

Estoy_Listo said...

It sounds melodramatic, and I suppose it is, but my heart aches for those of who live "about an hour from Seattle." They have no standing, no voice in their home state.

Kirk Parker said...

"which meant 13 percent of the population...."

That sounds downright.... unlucky.

wild chicken,

"it gives Bad Guy time to plan how to snatch it away."

I hear this claim made frequently, but somehow those making it -- including yourself right here -- never have any kind of stats to back up the claim. So is it more than just conjecture? Put up, or give it up.

And Cookie apparently checked out sometime in the '80s.... Accidental shootings are down, way down, from their peak.


Kirk Parker said...

Good Lord, Freder -- If you a link to a story to back up your claim, and the story does no such thing... don't you worry that people might actually follow the link, read the story, and discover you are even more full of crap than usual? The guy who was killed in this incident (a) caused the accident in the first place, then (b) started assaulting the other guy by ramming his car as they waited in a parking lot for police to arrive, and then topped it off by (c) starting to shoot at him.

Kirk Parker said...

Original Mike,

By saying "apprehend offenders", you are at least implicitly acknowledging that police in general can't be there in time to prevent the bad thing from happening to you, but merely to try to pick up some of the pieces afterwards.

Well, that's a big part of why people carry.

Original Mike said...

Ah, Kirk…

Tmitsss said...

My 5th Great-grandfather was a member of an anti-government militia. Disney did a 6 part mini-series in 1956 about the group.

Kirk Parker said...

Oh, sorry, I see my sarcasm detector is overdue for a tune-up!

Original Mike said...

No worries. You did yeoman's work actually reading a Freder link.

madAsHell said...

”An armed society is a very polite, and civil society.“

Freder blows up his own argument.

Cookie, removing firearms isn't going to correct those problems. In fact, I think it would exacerbate the issues you mention.

mikesixes said...

"...feeding farm animals on her family’s 12-acre compound,..."- they couldn't just call it a farm, could they? They have to make it sound like some kind of villain's lair.

Bilwick said...

The idea of a society of disarmed, compliant serfs is very appealing to State-shtuppers such as Cookie.

Firehand said...

" as a way to register conservative discontent on the issues of the moment: mask mandates, diversity and inclusion efforts, sex education lessons."
Ah yes, because that's all those things are, not CRT-based racist crap, not talking to grade-school kids about anal sex and other things. Oh yeah, that was a fine, non-biased way of describing this mess.

Drago said...

Cookie: "Nope, I left Florida for New York just shy of 41 years ago. I have not returned to the Sunshine State, though I still have family there. The thought makes me shudder."

The thought makes Floridians shudder even more.

effinayright said...

Freder Frederson said...
An armed society is a very polite, and civil society.

Bullshit! Here is a nice recent incident of two law abiding gun owners getting into a gunfight over a minor traffic accident. One of them ended up dead.
***********

Now, Freder: Don't get all Ui-Ui'ed up....

autothreads said...

Freder Frederson said...

So you don't really get that whole 1st amendment thing, do you? Especially when "schoolchildren" includes an age cohort of four or five to eighteen. Do you really believe high school students are incapable of evaluating what they are taught.


Do you really think it's a good look to wrap predatory teachers grooming kids and "queering" their classrooms in the First Amendment? Didn't seem to work in Virginia. Childless weirdos telling parents that they don't know what's good for their kids is not a winning political strategy, so keep it up please.

effinayright said...

Freder, one of the hallmarks of science is that its subject matter can be---and many times is----faslified. IOW science is an ongoing debate.

Not so, with CRT. It's treated as if its teaching came down from On High, handed to Kendi on stone tablets. It cannot be denied, and attempts at denial only mark the denier as a perpetrator and benefactor of evil.

Yeah, that's a recipe for a sound civil society----snort.

'Nother thing, chump: when teachers teach, they tell what happened and give the best explanation of when, why and how.

They do not teach that the persons next to you in class CAUSED those things to happen, BENEFITTED from thse things, and CONTINUE to oppress and persecute you to this day.

That's what CRT teaches.

Bilwick said...

Tmitiss: I believe I saw and enjoyed that anti-government Disney series you refer to. To this day the Liberty Tree song plays in my head. Today's New Tories would probably want it censored as "seditious."

effinayright said...

Freder Frederson said...
Everyone involved in pushing Critical Race Theory and Social Justice to schoolchildren needs to get pink slips.

So you don't really get that whole 1st amendment thing, do you? Especially when "schoolchildren" includes an age cohort of four or five to eighteen. Do you really believe high school students are incapable of evaluating what they are taught.
*****************
Of course. That's why we deny them the right to vote, you maroon. the entire POINT of considering such people not yet adults is that they still do not have the emotional maturity or the KNOWLEDGE to make informed decisions.

And the First Amendment certainly doesn't stand for the proposition that government employees can teach your kids any insane shit they wish.

Lurker21 said...

The Continental Army wasn't too big. That's where the 3% comes from. But a lot of men fought in militia units when the fighting was near them. Also, men passed in and out of the Continental Army as the war went on, so the number who were engaged in fighting at some point in the war was higher.

"An armed society is a polite society"? No, a polite society is polite even when everybody is armed. Robert Heinlein, who made the comment, was thinking of a society like the one he grew up in, where people weren't forever shooting each other in drive-bys. It's probably time to retire that quote.

About the article? Nothing to say really. Find the goofball or nutcase who disagrees with you. Ignore the ones who agree with you. All this stuff is brought forward to support the narrative. Other, inconvenient facts that don't support the narrative, or that support other narratives aren't brought forward.

In other news, a Virginia Republican legislator got ridiculed for a report saying that the debates between Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass should be taught in schools. Much laughter. It turned out that the legislator had it right, but the bureaucrats he sent his petition to, got it wrong. I don't know if the correction got as much publicity as the original story. Something similar with the Fauci/Marshall to-do earlier in the week.

Will Cate said...

I don't quite get why a homeschooling parent would even want to be on a local school board, but she seems like a perfectly nice person.

Mason G said...

"I don't quite get why a homeschooling parent would even want to be on a local school board..."

Because she's paying for the local schools, perhaps?

Jay Austin said...

Read the comments to the article. The WP readers truly live in a echo chamber.

cf said...

in an alternate reality, the liberation of American Women included gun proficiency. Lesbians in particular founded local, well-trained militias.

i've wonder why not in our realm.

In that reality, our early Colorado movie theater shoot down never happened. that kid knew there were at least 5 moms in that movie theater that carried weapons, it never entered his mind to bust into the dark shooting, killing.

but the women's movement is hapless, and so it's probably for the best; only the measured thoughtful few women get the guns.

geokstr said...

rehajm said...
On the other hand open carry makes attackers go after other people who are easier to rape and kill.

Concealed carry means bad guys have to guess.

1/16/22, 12:38 PM


But open carry also then restricts the population of potential victims, and the perps would still have to guess which of them might be carrying too.

Narayanan said...

Mason G said...
"I don't quite get why a homeschooling parent would even want to be on a local school board..."

Because she's paying for the local schools, perhaps?
-------------
she also need permission to home school >>>> declare intent and jump through a view hoops or lose your children to Great Father => State

Mason G said...

rehajm said...

"But open carry also then restricts the population of potential victims, and the perps would still have to guess which of them might be carrying too."

If people are comfortable open carrying, one might realistically wonder how many more are comfortable carrying concealed.

Seems to me, anyway.

Mason G said...

Narayanan said...

"she also need permission to home school >>>> declare intent and jump through a view hoops or lose your children to Great Father => State"

Even more reason to care about what the local government schools are teaching.

JMR said...

12 acres is much smaller than the author wants to portray it as. The woman has a bug yard all around.

Owen said...

Robert Cook @ 6:22: "...The state of the nation is not so perilous that citizens need to be armed en masse."

By that logic, you must decide what clothes to wear not on the basis of your local weather report, but on the national forecast. In which the "average temperature" is 100 degrees + 10 degrees/2 = 55 degrees, and the "average precipitation" is 10" of rain per hour + zero rain/2 = 5 inches of rain per hour. Of course in your actual location it is, say, 90 degrees and dry as a bone, but no matter, your heavy sweater and raincoat are just fine.

Why can't you admit that people address the circumstances that face them individually?

daskol said...

The greatest Catholic theologian, Thomas Aquinas, wrote as long ago as the 1260's: "Both an astronomer and a physical scientist may demonstrate the same conclusion, for instance that the earth is spherical; the first, however, works in a mathematical medium prescinding from material qualities, while for the second his medium is the observation material bodies through the senses."

Talk about selective quotation, Dr. Weevil! I looked it up. The very next sentence: "They are of course both wrong, as the world is self-evidently flat."

Fred Drinkwater said...

Rehajm, Mason,
I saw a likely example of that in 2015 in deGaulle airport.
A trio of uniformed security men, triangle formation, point man carrying a SMG of some sort. They were SO obvious, marching along, that I remarked to my wife "I bet there's three more in plainclothes and carrying concealed, right there in plain sight."

Robert Cook said...

Why can't you admit that people address the circumstances that face them individually?“

Because I do not believe most of the people who insist on being openly armed live in areas that are so dangerous as to require they carry arms for protection. I think these people are posturing.

TrespassersW said...

Robert Cook said...
Because I do not believe most of the people who insist on being openly armed live in areas that are so dangerous as to require they carry arms for protection. I think these people are posturing.

What you believe is irrelevant to what other people base their decisions on.

Also, the facts that there are areas where people are openly armed, and that these areas are not so dangerous could be--dare I say, are likely to be--related.

Robert Cook said...

"Also, the facts that there are areas where people are openly armed, and that these areas are not so dangerous could be--dare I say, are likely to be--related."

A tautology.

Original Mike said...

"A tautology."

The Butterfield Fallacy

Chris Lopes said...

"Sure doesn't make me feel safer."

Fortunately, Constitutional rights are not dependent on your feelings.

Chris Lopes said...



"A tautology."

He's suggesting there is a relationship between open carry and the lack of gun violence in places it's allowed. That you don't agree doesn't make it a tautology. Words have specific meanings.

Dr Weevil said...

daskol (10:53pm):
The next sentence says no such thing. Your statement is entirely false. Are you (a) a liar, (b) a fool who repeats other people's lies found on the web, or (c) someone who makes stupid and unfunny 'jokes'? Has to be one of the three.

Robert Cook:
As for tautologies, "open-carry states have more visibly-armed people" would be something like a tautology, though there may be places (parts of Chicago?) where open carry is widely practiced despite being still illegal. What Roy Jacobsen wrote is nothing like a tautology.

Freder Frederson said...

The guy who was killed in this incident (a) caused the accident in the first place, then (b) started assaulting the other guy by ramming his car as they waited in a parking lot for police to arrive, and then topped it off by (c) starting to shoot at him.

So just because the guy who started it was the one who ended up dead has exactly what to do with my point? I doubt the initial assailant would have been such a total asshole if he wasn't armed. Introducing another gun into the mix ended in tragedy.

TestTube said...

Robert Cook:

If it is posturing (and in some cases it probably is), then it is pricey posturing indeed. Carrying a side arm, openly or concealed, is a pain -- often quite literally.

That more people are carrying is a poor reflection on the state of the nation, no matter whether it is posturing or not. It means that more people are weighing the risk of being harmed against the inconvenience and cost (and risk!) of carrying a side arm, which are substantial.

This is consistent with a distrust in the ability of government to reduce the possibility of grievous harm.

What's more, is that this means bodily harm rather than just the loss of property -- I've taken two license to carry classes, and both have made quite clear the necessity of avoiding vigilante action or protecting property or using a firearm in anything other than situations which pose immediate and significant personal harm.

I prefer a society where owning, let alone carrying, a sidearm is a superfluous pretension, and would argue that until recently, at least in the areas I frequent, that is how things were. However, this seems less the case as of late. Obviously, there are others who agree, and would go even further. One could argue, as you do, that the state of the nation is not so perilous presently, but it appears that a significant number of people either disagree with you, or feel that things are headed in the wrong direction.

Have you taken the NYS pistol permit class? You might find it enlightening, even though you do not wish to obtain a firearm. I think that the Texas LTC should be taught in all Texas High schools, as it would provide young men a better understanding of the serious ramifications of using deadly force, and might prevent some violent crime.

Vance said...

Open carry?

For her, it might make sense. She apparently lives and works on a farm, in rural Washington.

A few more dangers than local Antifa. Things like bears, coyotes, etc. I have a close friend, owns 40 acres, working farm girl. She raises horses, goats, etc.

She doesn't carry a gun, but she always, but always, takes at least two very large and trained Okbosh and Pyrenees dogs with her. Because she has coyotes in the river basin crossing her land and the coyotes would love nothing more than to attack her. They don't care about concealed weapon or not.

Carrying weapons is, sometimes, more about protection from nature than from Democrats. Me, I'd carry to protect against Democrats, but for her, protection from bears and wolves is likely a bigger threat.

So: Cookie here wants her to disarm in the face of the local black bear population... Cook hates conservative women that much. Freder too, naturally.

dbp said...

I've been to Eatonville a lot: It's where my grandparents lived. They owned the local theater and it's where my dad is buried.

I would say that it's far beyond commuting distance to Seattle. When my wife and I flew-out for my dad's funeral a few year's back, we flew into SeaTac, which is between Seattle to the North and Tacoma to the South. The drive South to Eatonville took about an hour.

We visited my grandparents house often when I was a kid and I continued to visit once I could drive myself, but lots of times we flew into Eatonville in my Dad's Cessna. He managed a business in Tacoma and could get to Swanson Field (in Eatonville) in an hour and 45 minutes from Spokane. He'd stay with my grandparents and I'd come, either to visit or as cheap labor on the rental properties. In all the visits, I can't ever recall seeing anyone wearing a side arm.

Freder Frederson said...

Cookie here wants her to disarm in the face of the local black bear population... Cook hates conservative women that much. Freder too, naturally.

I don't think there is much chance of a bear attack at a school board meeting. Actually, there is little chance that you are going to be killed or injured by a bear at all. 2021 was a bad year with six deaths in North America (3 each in Canada and the USA). That is a hell of a lot fewer deaths, than say for, accidental firearm deaths.

TaeJohnDo said...

FF said, "...Introducing another gun into the mix ended in tragedy."

Not at all! It saved the guys life and took out a dangerous asshole with a history of violence. Not a tragedy at all.

TrespassersW said...

Robert Cook said...
"Also, the facts that there are areas where people are openly armed, and that these areas are not so dangerous could be--dare I say, are likely to be--related."

A tautology.


I'm going to assume that I did not make my point clear, so let's try this again: My point is that there is a causal relationship between the degree to which people are legally armed (open or concealed carry) and the degree of danger one faces from felonious assault. (The danger from wild animals doesn't factor in to this, as they don't know squat about who's armed and who isn't.)

If you still think that's a tautology, then you are adopting the Humpty Dumpty approach to that word.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

Talk about selective quotation, Dr. Weevil! I looked it up. The very next sentence: "They are of course both wrong, as the world is self-evidently flat."

Link please, because that seems to be a bald faced lie.

https://www.ccel.org/ccel/aquinas/summa.FS_Q54_A2.html