Monday, August 31, 2009

Daily Sketch


I've decided I'm going to try to do at least one meaningful sketch per day, either digitally or traditionally, and post it to this blog. I do not sketch nearly enough, and it is time to change that. This is a ten-minute head color and value study in Photoshop CS4. Dark environment, one backlight.

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Guns and Political Rallies



William Kostric, the man brandishing a pistol outside Obama's town hall meeting last week in Portsmouth, N.H. also carried a sign that read "It's time to water the tree of liberty!", referencing Thomas Jefferson's quote: "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants."

Consider we have progressed, as a nation, in the last 8 years. Can you imagine, shortly after September 11 carrying a firearm to ANY political rally, much less one anywhere near the president? Don’t think for a moment that you wouldn’t have been shipped off to Guantanamo in a heartbeat.

Why has this man not been arrested and charged with threatening the life of the president (18 USC Sec.871)? I realize he wasn’t technically breaking any local firearm laws, but we all know that’s bullshit. Gun-rights advocates everywhere are praising this man as a true patriot exercising his 2nd Amendment rights, yet if Bush was still the president they’d be calling this guy a terrorist. The slogan he was displaying was nothing less than thinly-veiled provocation of armed insurrection.

Would this man have received the same courtesy from police if he was of Middle-Eastern descent? A muslim?

Argue all you want to me about his constitutional rights, but my point is this: when you bring a gun to a political rally you are sending a very clear message indeed.

This has also created a disturbing trend, as now more people are bringing firearms to public events with the president, like the wingnut in Arizona carrying a goddamn assault rifle among a crowd of protesters. Reportedly there were over a dozen people in that crowd carrying firearms. Does anyone realize how pants-on-head INSANE this is? What do you think is going to happen when tensions escalate and one person decides to actually use his weapon, or a car backfires? Picture it. You’re in a crowd of angry protesters, all armed. Suddenly there's a loud bang. Everyone scatters, everyone pulls their pistols and starts aiming them in all directions. You don't think anyone will get hurt or worse? A safer nation indeed.

And all this because Obama wants everyone to have equal access to health care. Oh, what an evil concept! What tyranny! Where were these "patriots" when Bush was authorizing warrantless wiretapping and suspending habeas corpus? Fight the power, brothers.