YeeHaw! The wild west is comin' back, y'all!

Right here in Kansas! Pow! Zing! 

Sigh. The newly passed Kansas gun law is psycho and scary. "Norman Bates" psycho, scarier than the new Lucille Ball statue.

In Kansas, it's no longer required to get a permit, to register a firearm, to get training to carry and own a gun. In what world (and Oz doesn't count for you folks ready to jump on the Kansas joke bandwagon) does this make sense?

Clearly, it's gonna' raise the crime rate. The murder rate. I fully expect more children will die by gun-shot, intentionally or not ("Hey, new toy."). And domestic disputes will be decided with the gavel of a bullet.

Okay, let me step off my soap-box for a minute (but not before kicking it over like a rock star), and let's look at this law with a cold, clinical, non-judgmental eye. Guns kill. So do the people pulling the trigger. I'm not about to call the distinction between the two. But it takes both.

The people passing this law? Politicians. Why? Truly, I doubt they're personally itching to get their hands on guns so they can shoot it out--last-stand Peckinpah style--with opposing politicians to determine who gets to rule. (Then again...we're talking Kansas. And it might be a movie I'd like to see. Just don't want to see the real deal.). SO the real reason has to be to garner votes in one of the "reddest" states around.

And who benefits from this law? Law-breakers! Angry, cuckolded spouses! Bank-robbers and muggers! Batman villains! "Hills Have Eyes" mutants! Scary, scary people. I mean, how easy it'll be be to go out, acting upon a knee-jerk reaction, and pick up a gun. I imagine we'll also have an influx of ne'er-do-well sorts from out-of-state. On the bright side, it'll be good for Kansas commerce and the tourist industry!

Yesterday while taking my mother shopping (oughta' be a law against that!), I dropped her off at the front door of a store, parked the car. A horn blared out. I looked. Wasn't my car. This time the horn ground out louder, harsher. I went around to the other side. Some guy sat in the car parked next to me. He yelled, "How the hell'm I supposed to get outta' my car?" I was well within the parking lines. He's the one who'd crowded it. Yet, clearly, he thought the impetus was on me to move my car. Actually, I started arguing, kinda' pissed. Then I remembered the new Kansas law. No thanks. I moved my vehicle. Bad enough the guy was using his horn as a weapon.

I'm seriously considering abandoning Kansas. Then again, why should I let knucklehead politicians muscle me out. I don't give into terrorism (um, only to my mother's emotional blackmail).

Meanwhile, there's a new sheriff in town, pardner. Or, um, maybe not one at all.