It was my third year of city life at
the University of Wyoming. Granted, Laramie might
not qualify as a metropolitan center to most folks,
but since I was raised in the country I felt as
trapped as if I lived in downtown Denver. Ken, a
college buddy, grew up in the Devil’s Tower region
of Wyoming and he too felt out of place in the urban
jungle. Ken and I were trading hunting stories when
we decided to attack the opening day of duck season.
Apparently our enthusiasm was infectious and my
brother, Blaine, and two other friends agreed some
duck blind time would counter-balance their
career-enhancing cranky women and minority studies
classes.
On the sagebrush plains west of Laramie, there are a
half-dozen alkali laden lakes and we chose Twin
Buttes for our opening morning mallard attack. Being
dorm dwellers we lacked normal hunting gear, so we
borrowed a two-man inflatable raft and fashioned a
couple paddles out of scrap two-by-fours. We arrived
at the lake a good hour before daylight and could
hear ducks splashing in the shallows as we carried
our raft and gear to the water’s edge. Ken and I
planned to paddle to a small island while the other
three concealed themselves in makeshift blinds a
hundred yards away on the north shore. With Ken in
the bow and me the stern, I strained to launch us
into deeper waters; a task which proved impossible
as we were stuck in the mud. Nothing I tried could
free us, so Ken stood up, stretched over me and
threw his full weight into his two-by-four. Did I
mention Ken was a former college football player?
With his 250 pounds shifted to the stern, the bow
floated free and shot away from the bank. He could
have been seriously injured falling on our guns and
gear had it not been for my body cushioning the
impact. It was his lucky day.
Finally floating free, we paddled toward the island
with light just breaking over the eastern horizon.
The feeding ducks seemed happy; our antics not
alerting them the full wrath of Winchester was about
to rain on their parade. Over the next four hours,
we shot eight ducks; that was the easy part.
Retrieving them took longer because the resident
hall handbook specifically prohibits canines. We had
no dog. You would think an agriculture college would
make dog exceptions during duck season, but rules
are rules and this brings me to my point.
Notice, even though we were retriever-less we all
had our shotguns and ammo. It was 1977 and
university rules permitted firearms to be stored in
the office of each dorm to be checked out as needed.
A student headed to his duck blind at four o’clock
in the morning definitely needed his shotgun so it
was no uncommon to see camo-clad country kids
packing heat on campus. Things were normal in 1977.
Now let’s see the progress the ruling class has made
indoctrinating the unwashed over the past 36 years.
On March 1, 2013, seven-year-old Park Elementary
student, Joshua, chewed his strawberry Pop-Tart into
the shape of a pistol and received a two day
suspension for the offense. On April first of this
year, two students duck hunting adjacent to
Stevenson University provoked a 9-1-1 call
triggering a three-hour lockdown of this Baltimore,
Maryland campus. Do you see a pattern? Sportsmen who
have bought the lie the Second Amendment is about
hunting and access to public lands need to think
before answering. You are being decoyed.
The “right to keep and bear arms” is about freedom
and the ability of the common man to repel tyranny.
It will not take another 36 years to convince voters
guns are inherently evil and their removal from
public ownership is for the greater good. Our
massive federal government will never take our
firearms by force. Instead, after years of softening
and re-education you will surrender them without
firing a shot. Welcome to the new, politically
correct, progressive America. One entire political
party and one-fourth of another would repeal the
Second Amendment if they could. Your vote matters
and if you do not educate yourself, you will be
educated by the ruling class. Think about it.
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