by Ken Hanson, Esq.
Saturday April 23, 2011 marked a personal milestone for me. On this day, I personally became enough of a pain-in-the-ass to The Cleveland Plain Dealer that my name earned search meta-tag status on Cleveland.com. In a hysterical (in both the “funny” sense and “foaming at the mouth, chewing the carpet” sense) editorial column, Plain Dealer columnist Brent Larkin lamented the possibility that the state and federal constitutional right to self-defense might extend to restaurants.
To celebrate this achievement, my family and I went to dinner and a movie. (“Hop,” and it was a really bad movie. Not that you asked.) During dinner at Applebees I courageously managed to avoid becoming falling down drunk. Or even under the influence of alcohol. I have cleared my calendar for Monday and Tuesday for what I am sure will be a flood of interviews with publications such as The Plain Dealer, reporting on how I somehow found the moral and emotional strength to eat in a restaurant granted a liquor license without getting into a massive brawl with other patrons.
Perhaps most illustrative of Larkin’s disconnect from reality is the portion of his article where he (in his mind) taunts the legislators considering the restaurant-carry bill via the brilliant (in his mind) non-sequitur of allowing concealed carry in the Capitol building. The clear, but unspoken, conclusion is that legislators would find such a law outrageous, since the only possible result would be legislators gunned down on the House floor over policy differences. Blood in the streets, restaurants, AND Capitol!
Oh how Mr. Larkin’s head would explode if he read the amendments already circulated in Ohio’s General Assembly, which would, among other things, allow legislators and their staff to carry in the Capitol building, and allow citizens to bring firearms in their cars into the Capitol parking garage. How he would weep if he examined the Revised Code and discovered there is no law prohibiting OPEN carrying/possession of firearms in the Capitol. (Indeed, there is only a rule against firearm possession promulgated by the Capitol Square Advisory Board. While it is against the law to break a rule of the CSAB, this has already been shown to be an unenforceable proposition, given the numerous instances of open carry marches/possession of firearms during Tea Party/9-12 rallies on Capitol Square.)
So in Mr. Larkin’s world, the only bulwark standing between his peaceful Nirvana and a Capitol awash in blood is an administrative rule that is, in practice, impossible to enforce.
The leadership team of Buckeye Firearms Association is proud to announce that our very own Linda Walker has been elected to a position on the National Rifle Association’s Board of Directors. The NRA made the public announcement in Pittsburgh at the NRA Annual Meetings on Saturday.