I have to be honest and say that I never really understood what it was really all about. Today I had my own issue of "property rights" come up when there was shooting near by as I raked leaves. I called 911 because I was genuinely uncomfortable, if not downright scared. It's been a long long time since I have been that close to rifle fire. I left the active USMC in 1960. I was told by the 911 dispatcher that I was silly. This is hunting season. I tried to explain that I live in a development and that these shots were near by. I got a kind of "so what" response. I guess I did sound upset because a number of hours later a Deputy came by to explain that there are no ordinances prohibiting people from discharging firearms in our development or anywhere else. If they were to fire at the house that would be a vioation. (She never suggested that shooting at me would be. The Tea Baggers have publicly threatened me and the President.) As I thought about this I remembered the election issue. Read on below and I'll try to explain.
It seems that the United Nations is sneakily trying to take our property rights away somehow. The ploy is somehow being disguised as the mandate for the Counties in Virginia to set up "planning commissions". Our county's Planning Comission got some of the more reasonable folk to ask me to come speak to the Board of Supervisors a year or so back because the right wingers who would soon become our version of the Tea Party were trying to pressure the comission to get rid of any mention of "possible" man made global warming and a resultant rise in sea level. The prime properties in the County are all on the water. The last decade's hurricanes have played hell with a lot of them.
Now everyone in the County who reads my letters to the editor or read the account of what I said to the Board of Supervisors either love what I say (minority by far) and see me as speaking for them because they are not willing, or they are sure I am an agent of Joe Stalin.
I have said little in the paper for some time now because it gives a bunch of rather deranged sounding wing nuts fuel for diatribe. Judging from the level of political "discussion" I have experienced, even with the local Democratic Committee, I see no value in stirring that pot. Murphy's Law says
Never argue with a fool. People may not see the difference.
So today was sobering for me. The folks out there shooting their heads off were not hunters. The shots were too frequent and any animal in its right mind would not have stood around for hours being a target. It was a bit like when I went to the range to qualify in the USMC. But practically in my yard? Maybe the sound carries far in thick woods? Not likely. We own a 2 and 3/4 acre lot and it is mostly woods and all the other 25 or so equally sized lots in the development have lots of trees even if we are among the most wooded.
More disturbing is the crazy juxtaposition of "property rights" issues here. There have been huge signs around the County for months inviting people to these meetings in religious right Churches to learn about the big threat to their property rights. The Republican trio that tried to unseat the incumbents on the Board of Supervisors kept using this Planning Comission and related issues to try to show how lax our incumbents were. (They are all Independents and past attempts to politicize the local elections have backfired.) They came closer than ever before and this crazy United Nations Trojan horse seemed to be why.
Now at the same time these people are well armed and shoot up the countryside! Hey! Is this a great country or what? Something is afoot here that makes the notion of there being a 99% sort of tenuous at best. Help me out. What am I missing? The politics of fear does not spill over into fear of being shot in your own back yard. It sure does get folk upset about the UN though. It's been a nice day.