More rain for eastern Australia

This can't be good news for the rain-soaked Aussies.
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Arms Race

Bigger is better, right? I recently wrote this about Utah's impending legislation to adopt a state firearm. Everybody warned me that irony may not go over that well in the current environment, and it didn't help that my final comment went right over the head of the editorial board and was omitted at "their editorial discretion." I wanted the last paragraph to read,

Some may say that a machine gun is too crude of a choice for an emblem that will appear alongside the beehive, sego lily and seagull. Perhaps we could reach a compromise by choosing a more sporting weapon. Luckily, Browning is also known for his excellent shotguns. Just remember to remove the official "Juan Antonio Samaranch*" presentation plaque, lest the state embarrass itself.

Without that comment, a lot of the irony and my intended message is lost.

CD Bales: Oh, ho, ho, irony! Oh, no, no, we don't get that here. See, uh, people ski topless here while smoking dope, so irony's not really a, a high priority. We haven't had any irony here since about, uh, '83, when I was the only practitioner of it. And I stopped because I was tired of being stared at.

*I know that the public has a short memory, but I expected more from the local "paper of record." I know that Pat Bagley could've refreshed their memory about Samaranch, if they'd asked him. As the story goes from the 1990's, Salt Lake City was afraid of losing out again in their attempts to get the Winter Olympic Games. They were afraid that the Swiss or French Canadians would get the games, like what happened before with Nagano, if they didn't "grease the wheels" to win some favor. The bid committee agreed and started a systematic effort to give visiting Olympic dignitaries the VIP treatment. The rank and file got $1k/night prostitutes. Samaranch, the chair of the Olympic committee, got extra attention. They started by investigating his sporting interests. They found he liked skeet shooting- a perfect match for a gift of a pair of Browning made, exceptionally fine skeet guns. I think they threw in an antique 1894 rifle, too, just for good measure. Needless to say, when all of the facts came out, especially about the hookers used as bribes, it was a big embarrassment; not at all the "wholesome" image that the state was trying to project. The bid committee was sacked, and they brought in Mitt to mend fences.

The comments posted on the Tribune site show that maybe not everyone missed the irony. I really liked the comment that suggested using the beehive as a machine gun emplacement.

the ma deuce is a bad motha. we could mount the ma on top of the beehive and have a nice field of fire.

I guess that the "field of fire" would be pointed at the other state emblems. The dutch oven is already shot to hell. One more move and that bird gets it! It's coming right for us!

p.s. I'm sticking with my choice for the state firearm. By choosing the "fifty" for the state gun would open up a lot of super fun possibilities. We could set up a ball turret ride at the state fair. Kids would be right at home spinning around and blasting away at the Nazi menace with with their twin 50s. I'm getting a little seasick just thinking about it.

p.p.s. Here are a couple of Mauldin cartoons, for old time sake.
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p.p.p.s. It's official. Gov. Herbert signed the bill. I did make one last ditch effort in a vain attempt to get the bill vetoed. I wrote this and emailed it to the governor:

Dear Governor Herbert:

Please, veto the bill designating the M1911 as the state gun. I think it is much more appropriate to honor the man himself, John M. Browning, rather than a military weapon. You did the right thing by designating a "John M. Browning" day, to honor an important Utah inventor.

Of all the arguments that I heard against the bill, for me the most convincing was that school children in the primary grades do "coloring" exercises to learn about the state symbols. If you sign this bill, then kids will be coloring in the M1911 .45 caliber automatic handgun, right along with the sego lily, seagull, and blue spruce. I think a handgun is totally out of place in that context- it just doesn't fit in that set of items. I wrote a tongue-in-cheek letter to the Salt Lake Tribune which attempted to point out that absurdity. In that letter, I wrote that if Utah were to choose any gun to honor Browning, that we choose his M2HB, the famous .50 caliber heavy machine gun, instead. I know when I was in the third grade, I was constantly drawing planes, tanks, and trucks, always equipped with machine guns! I see one important difference: people don't actually possess machine guns, while it is quite likely that they do have handguns. That means if kids look through their parent's drawers, they just might find a dangerous firearm, and they might think it's just as harmless as a seagull!

There's just no need to allow this become law and make Utah the first state with an "officially designated firearm." The intent to honor Browning will be lost in the controversy, and it will end up being just as much of an embarrassment to Utah. The bill's author's intent was to honor Browning. I urge you to send this back to the legislature by asking them to honor the man himself, not one of his many inventions. I agree that Browning should be elevated along with other great and innovative Utahns, which include Farnsworth, Sorensen, and Huntsman. We don't honor Farnsworth for one of his patents; we honor the sum of his achievements which resulted in television.

Signed,
Douglas D. Mayne