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Well, I got back from California this afternoon. Actually, I got back last night, but spent the night in Amarillo...... Anyway, we are SO glad to be back, and both my wife and I commented on and agreed about a few things:

1. We are no longer "ex-Californians", we are Texans. Maybe not by birth, but most certainly by choice.
2. California is irredeemable. It is SO much worse than the last time we were there.
3. The streets that were — in our memories — broad and free flowing, were actually narrow and choked with traffic.
4. The drivers, which I used to believe were the best in the nation, are rude and poorly skilled these days.
5. (On the positive side) El Portal in Pasadena is still the best Mexican restaurant in the United States.
6. Californian's, even my more or less conservative friends there, are flabbergasted by the concepts accompanying individual liberty and Classical Liberalism.
7. We saw brown air. California's environmental fascists can't keep up with its burgeoning, increasingly foreign, population. It is getting positively 3rd world there.

There's more, but those are the "highlights". We came away realizing that the California of our youth and all the great memories we had are just that - memories. With California, you truly can't go back.......but even if you could, there would be some democrat law against it. We enjoyed northern Arizona, and we love the drive through New Mexico, and would gladly explore either of those two states on future vacations. But going forward, the only thing that will get us back to California to visit is the maintenance of family relationships. Californians have ruined California for good.

Scott Farkus wrote:I don't think I would have rubbed it in the poor clerk's face, but I understand exactly what you're saying.

That's why I felt kind of bad afterwards. Apparently, I had suffered a momentary cerebrovocal disconnect and the words just came right out of my mouth.....then he was gone. I wasn't trying to be snarky at all, it just seemed so obvious to me in the moment that I gave voice to the thought — kind of like when you're looking for something, find it, and say "there you are, you rascal you!"

So as some of you may know, I am visiting California right now (typing this from my Pasadena hotel room), and this past Wednesday I dropped by the gunstore/outdoors supplier I used to do business with in town just to observe the climate and chat up the guys behind the gun counter to see what's up. I asked one of the gun counter guys what was new in the procedure for buying a gun in California, and asked him what they were going to do about the new legislation coming down the road. After talking for a couple of minutes, I said "I don't know how you guys do it". He replied, "You get used to it."

I looked right at him and said, "Well, there's your problem." He kind of blinked for a second, didn't reply, and walked away.

I felt kind of bad, because I certainly didn't mean to insult him, but I think that really IS the problem. I realize that gun owners (and conservatives/libertarians and other people who value the 2nd Amendment) are pretty outnumbered in California, but they aren't THAT outnumbered. I offer this as a comparison, and I am NOT making a statement of judgement about this particular subset of The People, but the entire LGBTQ community constitutes something less than 3% of the entire population; and yet, they are not afraid to get loud and insistent, and so far, they've gotten every single thing they wanted in terms of their political agenda. I do realize that gun owners suffer under an extra burden, and that is the perception by a segment of the public that we present an existential danger to them, and that therefore the kind of infantile antics that TOCOTSNBN (the open carry organization that shall not be named, and its Tarrant county former affiliate) are counterproductive to the furthering of the RKBA, but those activities included such provocative actions as parading around with EBRs and all tacticalled out, and it scared some people. But rather, I am talking about organized peaceful but loud protests, marches in the streets, with signs, etc., and I can't help but wonder if California's gun owners would be far less oppressed if they acted up - JUST like LGBTQ or immigration activists act up (when they do so lawfully).

Because when you just "get used to it", it can only get worse.

I don't want to be uncharitable, but I think that is what it is going to take, and to the extent that California gun owners aren't willing to, is the extent to which they will continue to be oppressed by the state.

What do you guys think? Am I out of line, or am I making sense?