Guns And Liquor Don't Mix - And Response (5)

  • Thursday, July 16, 2009

This is just what we need, another opportunity for some demented drunk to whip out his weapon and start showing everybody how tough he or she is by shooting his piece off in a crowd.

Rule one, gasoline and liquor don't mix. Rule two, liquor and guns don't mix.

Why do you need a gun to order a meal? Why do you insist that you be armed to order a beer? I have not talked to anyone who supports this foolish so called "right to bare arms" in restaurants and bars law.

Go West if you are so hung up on walking around armed or join the police force.

Chuck Mehan
cbm2006@comcast.net

* * *

Gun owners who lawfully have a concealed carry permit 'cannot drink' while patronizing a restaurant or bar, or they will lose their permit.

Bob Bogart
quasi17@comcast.net

* * *

I'm trying to make sense of the system, using the reasoning of the anti-gun activist who posted here. Since this argument has been raging for weeks and he is still so uninformed, you have to wonder what finally jogged his conscience. It's clear that he knows nothing about gun carrying laws. But that doesn't surprise me when our own City Council doesn't seem to either.

Hear me out. Please.

Something seems very wrong if I only have to show proof of age, using a valid drivers license, to drink alcohol and then drive off in my automobile and endanger the lives of everyone I encountered along the way home. If I was alone, this would be not only possible but probable. But who cares? It would be legal.

Side two of that reasoning says if I entered the same establishment as a card-carrying handgun carrier with my handgun out of sight but on my person and ordered iced tea or other non-alcoholic beverage, which is required by law when I have my handgun on me, I would become a criminal just because the restaurant owner says I can't have my weapon in there, even though I had been cleared by the FBI and had all the necessary credentials and the state had already ruled that I could do so.

But its the third side to this reasoning, or lack of, that is worrying me the most. Trigger-happy hotheads and criminals DON'T have carrying permits and don't care what some restaurant owner says. They usually cannot 'hold' their liquor and will continue to do as they please and for sure will have their guns on them.

I honestly don't understand where you anti-gun activists are coming from and will never undestand the decisions made by the local councilmen. I hope everyone remembers this when they come up for re-election.

If you consider the three points above, just where is the rationale used by the anti-gun activists and City Council?

Carole Reese
Chattanooga

* * *

You are very right on that statement. Carrying a loaded handgun and drinking alcohol beverages do not mix. Enough said, but can I have a steak, shrimp, Mexican, Italian, Chinese or any other food in America and carry my weapon if I want to, please.

Some places here in Chattanooga, I will not drive through without a loaded weapon in my vehicle. I don't drink alcohol anyway. I am a licensed commercial truck driver and can not afford to drink and drive either. The same rules apply to me whether I drive my big rig or my personal vehicle. These is no tolerance for a commercial driving license. It is not worth drinking and driving. The same applies to carrying a loaded weapon and drinking, it is not worth it.

I respect all the signs that are hung on the outside of buildings that do not want weapons brought inside. Lord knows only how many are already inside some of these places illegally with a gun. I just wish someone would make a standard sign that is big enough to be seen and read easily from say 20 feet away. I have seen the words "no weapons" in as little as 1/4 inch letters high to three inches tall on signs.

I don't go to parks or anywhere else that block myself from carrying my weapon. You can go down to the river, city or county parks if you want to, or any other place that has a no weapons policy, but I'll find other places and things to do that I feel safer doing. If I can't carry where I want to go, then I just don't go there. We have too many other places that do want our business and realize we are not crazy, stupid, idiotic people with a gun who are drunk.

I'll let everyone else go to these places so the criminals will know they can do whatever they want and know that no one is armed.

I have been out west thank you, I have been to all 48 states. I don't care about being a police officer either. My grandfather was a policeman for almost 30 years in Memphis. I do respect and honor each law enforcement officer for their services to all of us.

I agree with Judge Moon's thoughts on carrying a gun, and I feel safer carrying a loaded gun than without. I really don't understand what all the fuss is about. You would never know most of us that are legally armed are even carrying a loaded weapon. Mine is usually concealed and no knows I am even armed, unless you ask me.

To have gone through the training, background checks and costs, to be legally armed, makes you a person with some idealism of right and wrong to begin with. If you have ever done anything illegally in your past, you will not be permitted to carry a gun legally. If you do drink alcohol and carry a gun and you are caught, you will lose your permit, a lot of money and time in jail possibly. The same goes for a commercial truck driver, if you drink and drive and you are caught, you will lose your license, a lot of money, your job and possibly jail time also.

As a legally armed person, I fully understand the rules and regulations that are applied to me. Does everyone else understand them? I don't think so, or we would not have all the complaining and discussions we have about legally armed people. Most of the people that do complain have no idea of how to even use a gun, all they know is someone told them to be scared of anyone who is carrying a gun.

I learned to fire a rifle and shotgun at the age of 13. I was in the military and have fired most all the weapons back then from 45 caliber pistol to a 155 Howitzer Cannon. Some weapons were even fully automatic, which means as long as I had the trigger pulled with plenty of ammo loaded, the weapon was continuously firing live rounds down range.

Most often, law enforcement officers are not where a crime is being committed at the time it is being done, but I know they will be on the way shortly after someone or myself calls them. I want to make sure I am able and alive, if possible, to call them for help in taking the criminal to jail and to court for prosecution in case something does happen.

At age 63, I have seen a lot of this world change from a peaceful nation to being full of criminals at every corner we turn. Yes, I have even scared off several criminals who tried to rob me while I was driving coast to coast to bring everyone the produce, dry goods and whatever else someone wanted to pay me to haul legally in my trailer so folks here in Chattanooga and other cities could have to sell, buy or enjoy.

With all the shootings we are having in Chattanooga, I have even gone to carrying my weapon in my yard and inside my home. I have a chain link fence totally around my property, but I know that does not matter to someone wanting to do harm or commit criminal acts. I have installed extra lighting for nights and a home alarm system. I can only say that some people want only criminals to carry a gun, illegally also, and do all they want to law abiding people.

Best wishes and safety to you on your endeavors to any place where guns are not permitted. I will not be in attendance anyway.

John Appling
East Lake Area

* * *

The people who are, by far, most likely to do the nonsense that Mr. Mehan described are the ones who have already been carrying their guns into these places for years and years. How often do we hear about people whipping out his weapon and start showing everybody how tough he or she is by shooting his piece off in a crowd? Very seldom, if ever (I'm not talking about the seemingly daily shootings that we have been hearing about the past few months, that's a different scenario altogether), yet now that law-abiding people will be allowed to carry their guns into venues that serve alcohol, the aforementioned nonsense-scenario described by Mr. Mehan is somehow going to start being a regularity?

Criminals who already illegally carry guns into bars are too reserved to do that, yet law-abiding, clean record-having citizens will be the ones to start shooting their "...piece off in a crowd?" I fail to see any logic in that.

To answer your questions:
1.) We don't need a gun to order a meal.

2.) We don't insist that we be armed to order a beer. As has been run into the ground several times over on this website, it is 100% illegal to consume any amount of alcohol whatsoever while in possession of a firearm.

Dallas Cole
Chattanooga
Dallas-Cole@hotmail.com

* * *

First let me say that there are currently three guns in my house. One is a shotgun and two are handguns. I think this adequately proves that I'm not an anti-gun activist. That having been said, I don't think that guns belong in any establishment serving alcohol.

Sure, the new law says that if you're packing, you can't drink alcohol. If you think that will be absolutely followed by every permitted gun owner, you're naive.

All the the carry permit means is that you've been to a gun safety class and you haven't been caught and convicted doing anything that could give you a legal record. That's it. Having a permit doesn't prove you're an angel and it doesn't prove that you're not capable of acting just as stupidly as anyone else.

If you're so scared of going out without your guns, maybe you ought to just stay home.

Angie Hartzler
Brainerd
ahartzler@yahoo.com

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