"Gun control" in Pennsylvania....

Those of you from elsewhere might wonder why PA is always regarded as a swing state when we have these two gigantic metropolitan areas which should make us deep blue. The reason is that the rest of the state...well, let me relate a story to you:

I have a friend, originally from NY, who married a lady from outside Williamsport, located in the north central portion of the state. He moved up the and gave me a perspective as to the mindset of those who reside there. He said, "The real unemployment rate up here is close to 40%, what with Sylvania and Bethlehem Steel closing. If a political candidate could actually promise full employment, new schools, repaved roads to replace the horrors of driving up here, water and sewer, and cable TV which is reliable along with better rural electrification, but he or she wanted to ban private ownership of bazookas and tanks, he or she would lose in a landslide. That's how Narrow the thinking is up here."

And he had an arsenal: four rifles, two shotguns, a working WWII Luger, and enough ammo to hold off the Revenoors, as Snuffy Smith used to call them, for days. He had a closet filled with all kinds of rounds, and said to me in all seriousness, "This is nothin'. You should see some homesteads, they look like Ft. Bragg."

So a few years ago, and I had posted this at the time, he called me up and said,"I feel like Jed Clampett. They told me my worthless land was filled with frackable material and I'm rich now. Unbelievable." He moved to Florida and retired more or less at age 52. He gave away his guns to his brother-in-law.

Oh yes, he was known as a 'pacifist' up there, 'cause he wasn't totin' any REAL weaponry, or, as they pronounce it up there at times, "weepins".