Dave -
I agree...
For most that is true... but maybe not before pulling a Kyle Rittenhouse... one of my neighbors who I like and have a lot of respect for in many dimensions has a 14 year old son who handles his wide range of big-boys-toys with a lot of respect, but sadly I can imagine with just the wrong tweaking, him "taking a gun to town", and while they are all well locked in safes, they have a plethora of them, and no lack of ammunition.
Your "Righty" friends, fully prepared for the Zombie Apocalypse, like almost everyone I know that is affiliated with a "militia" are all bluster. They will not seek out a fight.
My community-of-origin (living there from age 5-12) were all hard-working ranchers and sawyers and other folks who got dirty for a living... the local bar owner and the grocer were probably the only ones who didn't literally "sweat" for a living. One of the crustiest old cowboys I knew (father of a friend) was captured in an oral history before he died acknowledging that while out on horseback he was always "packing". He had a tiny (I know the model well) Sears and Roebuck 7 shot .22 pistol loaded with snake-shot *specifically* for the very rare rattlesnake he might encounter and feel the need to dispatch to protect his horse (narrow trail?)... he only used it twice. Another friend's father showed up on national TV in the 80s with a pair of nickel-plated model-1911 Automatics in shoulder holsters confronting the USFS, US Marshalls, etc. Ammon Bundy style, claiming they "had no right" to enter *his property* which in fact was federal land for which he had a permit to graze cattle but who had been out of compliance with the terms for some time and refused access to the local officials. Guess which one I have more respect for?Ranchers and farmers will be too busy dealing with a drought to take up arms against anyone. Plus they are mostly fatalists at heart and will "simply wait it out."
I have a friend who was on the line in Kent State... on the National Guard side. He didn't shoot anyone, but he says it still haunts him to this day that he might have.The police will be all to willing to wade into the fray, just as they did in the sixties. Ammon Bundy, BTW, supports BLM because his decidedly "Righty / Trumpy" faction sees BLM as confronting a common enemy - the State in the form of the police.
It is a sad fact that my tiny "spur" of a dirt road with 3 other
homes had to be given a proper name (no more Rural Route address)
for 9-11 emergency reasons... it got named "Bundy Road" about 15
years ago without my ever knowing it was up for naming. So I
tend to explain it as "Bundy Road, like Al or Ted" but have taken
to adding "Al or Ted or maybe Ammon".
We are currently in a "feud" with the Bureau of Reclamation, the
local Pueblo, and the Prime Contractor on the major water project
underway to move (most) everyone from private wells to "city
water". Our 4 remote homes get the pleasure of having a huge
industrial project involving infiltration wells and pumping
station in our back yard to feed a system many don't want and will
never reach us (with processed, treated water) anyway. It was
sited out of sight/sound from us (and everyone else) during the
public input phase, but a minor tweak pushed it into our front
yards without further notice. I am fatalistic about the project
but my neighbors are exquisitely angry at all of the above and out
of solidarity I am supporting them as best I can.
The project is terribly invasive to them (I have an 8' tall adobe
courtyard wall and trees, they are in very contemporary/modern
styled homes with huge picture windows facing the site, etc.) and
after several rounds of the BofR and others mistaking our private
drive for a public right-of-way, the project backed off to only
needing to "trespass" on my property. To avoid trespass with me
they would have to move a power pole and rebuild a fence and
regrade a road, they won't admit how costly/delaying that would be
and have kept making promises and wheedling to get me to grant
them free access. They agreed originally (3 months ago) to pay
for a privacy fence for the neighbors, reducing dust, sound,
visual (both ways, cuz my neighbors all have lots of expensive
toys they are sure everyone is planning to steal from them),
intrusion. I granted a 3 month temporary easement based on that
concept, but when the estimate came in (who knew 8' coyote fence
cost $100/lf?) the construction company balked and claimed they
had never "committed to anything". And then had the temerity to
be offended when I wasn't ready to renew the easement. They can
squeak most construction trucks in without trespass, but cranes
and concrete trucks and other heavy equipment really needs "a new
road without a power pole in the way" or a legal easement from
me. The savings to the project of NOT moving the pole and
cutting a road has to exceed the fence cost, not even counting the
delays implied. BUT they don't want to set a precedent, etc...
so came back with an offer to plant trees along the fenceline (as
an expansion to the reforestation they already have to do in the
Bosque) which we accepted, pending approval of their specific
plans and making sure *we* could water them through the 4-6 year
required to get big trees into the water table here. They have
another month of temporary easement to come up with a good "plan"
and I'm expecting a lame/lowball response and suspect they are
just "kicking the can down the road", but we will see.
The bottom line is that 2 of the other 3 houses might easily have
come to armed confrontation if the Feds and the Pueblo and the
Construction Company had continued to attempt to trespass on
*their* land, and I feel like I"m getting a hairy eyeball from
them half of the time because I *have* given legal easement,
albeit temporary AND with the quid-pro-quo of some concessions
around privacy/etc. I keep expecting to see BIA, Pueblo, Sherrif,
State Police out there any month now. Some of them voted for
Johnson/Weld last time, but without that choice, I'm expecting a
straight MAGA ticket all the way, down the line. But I'm not
angry at them, or even "skeered of" them, but I am sorry for them
insofar as those attitudes go. I don't know if they even know my
politics, excepting that I'm a vegetarian and think "guns are for
sissies and that a Harley isn't a Motorcycle and Ford is not the
only truck brand". I still bring them excess eggs and tomatoes
and squash and am ready to help them any way I can, and trust they
would do the same for me, but not sure if I put up a BLM or
Biden/Harris sign how friendly they would be My Buttigeig/Bernie
stickers on my truck may be too subdued.<TMI, TMI, TMI>
The "flight" has already begun. Couer d'ALene Idaho was, last year, the number one destination of Californians who identify as other than Democratic. There will be conflicts for sure, but along the axes of wealth and effete lifestyle, not politics. Within a ten square mile area of where I live, I can name more than twenty families building homes to "escape" California and its politics. And yes, I know, anecdotes are not evidence.
I'll see your anecdote and offer you my own. I have a good
friend in Spokane who teaches the children of those folks moving
in (and already in) Couer d'Alene at the college level (he
commuted 45 mins each way before COVID). Many come to him from a
home-school environment, most come with a strong suspicion of
"Science" and while none have declared "Flat-Earth", many declare
that "Science is a cult/religion" and are pretty strong
Creationists. He teaches an advanced lower-division Physics
course where he's trying to imbue his students with "Scientific
Thinking". He's pretty confident that every year he's taken in
40-60 students who were deeply leery of him and his subject and
turned out *most* of them with a healthy understanding why it
doesn't have to be an either-or, that they can learn the
scientific method and study math and physics and even taboo
subjects like paleontology and evolution without losing their
faith in the Bible ("if it ain't King James, it ain't Bible!").
He has even had to ask one last year to "leave his guns at home"
since the school itself doesn't allow open-carry, and this young
man thought that didn't mean him. With the new blanket
"concealed carry" in Idaho, he's thankful to not have to be
wondering which purse, backpack, or parka is "packing" in his
classroom (he's doing 100% remote teaching even though he much
prefers in-person).
But that isn't the clap-back anecdote... just color for framing.
A couple of weeks ago he went to northern Idaho (near the CA
border) to visit a friend who moved there 20+ years ago to escape
the rat race of California himself. When he moved there, he felt
there was a bit of an antagonisticly "individualistic" attitude
but he is a live-and-let-live kinda guy, and integrated well into
the "community" which was significantly "summer retreats" for
most. In the last 5 years, he says many of those summer homes
have become full-time homes as those people retired or sold to
people such as you describe. He still wants to be "live and let
live" but the anecdote armatures around his experience that the
few "wild west" characters packing a .45 on their hip and maybe a
deer rifle in their pickup, have been swamped out by modern
camoed-up, open-carry weekend warriors in expensive SUVs/Hummers,
etc. with oversized flags flapping from pickup beds, etc. There
is a LOT of loud engine noise in the forest from off road
vehicles, ATVs and a LOT of gunshots, some clearly entire clips
unloaded fast as possible from a semi-auto (into *what* kind of
backstop?). The conversations at the local cafe/store/bar have
gone from "country lifestyle" things about forest fires, pickup
trucks, weather and hunting prospects to trash-talking the places
they came from (a lot from Southern California). He claims that
many are self-identified "Retired LEO" who "moved up there because
they are tired of all the XXs and YYs and the snowflake liberal
P*****s", etc. (XX and YY => pick your racist name). As an old
white hippy that could be mistaken for a mountain man or a biker,
he knows he blends in (and owns guns and a pickup truck himself)
but his wife (also an old hippy) who is a health care worker now
only goes straight from home to work and back and patently does
NOT feel comfortable among this new (or newly emboldened?)
crowd. She still has a few friends she is comfortable around,
but it definitely went from "live and let live" to something a LOT
more aggressive. My friend who has been visiting there for
roughly 10 years every summer has seen heard this change himself,
but they live it. The change in demographic might just be the
wave of baby-boomers retiring or it might have something to do
with the 2016 election. I think William Gibson uses the term
"Ameristan" to describe this kind of right-wing
Utopia-in-the-making?
I'm also surprised that you are comfortable with the
Californication of Utah? Private property and all says anyone
can sell to anyone and anyone can buy from anyone (ignoring
redlining practices). It *is* beautiful country and the new
"telecommute" standards that came with COVID do suggest that lots
of urban/suburban folks may well move to the country for one
reason or another.
Those who will not / cannot accept four more years will take to the streets in mass protest. Unfortunately, it seems like those protests cannot occur any longer without arson and property destruction. And guess what the response to that will be.
Military-geared, unmarked (presumably) federal officers grabbing
protestors off the streets into unmarked vans, holding them in
undisclosed locations without charge for as long as they dare? 17
year olds with high capacity semi-autos driving in from out of
state, shooting protestors to "help keep law and order"? Sounds
about right. Doesn't sound like a Right-Wing Utopia either,
unless of course it is only Lefties being snatched and shot....
(Un)fortunately right now Portland (and the rest of us) has
bigger problems (as Glen pointed out) than the amount of damage
some protestors leading to some looting and vandalism, or a convoy
of Gun-Nuts threatening (shooting at) them with their trucks (and
guns). My daughter living there doesn't know anyone evacuated
yet, but plenty under evacuation warnings, and is preparing to
double up and host a family if it becomes necessary and I'm
preparing to offer the same if it comes to that. We are a
wealthy (and once-upon-a-time) generous culture who can do a lot
more positive things for one another than it seems like we do
these days. New Mexico absorbed a number of families after
Katrina (and more acutely horses and dogs and other pets/animals
that refugees couldn't maintain while waiting to return,
rebuild).
We really don't need a civil war OR 4 more years of an acutely eroding culture/Democracy. Vote early, Vote often (as Donald suggests)!
- Steve
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