Travel Book Guru Boycotts Arizona over Gun-toting Protestor

And the mayor and director of tourism are not happy! Good. Arizona does a huge tourism business in the winter so this is not good news to state officials considering our huge budget shortage.

I guess people don't like to vacation in a place where loons are walking the streets with assault rifles. Go figure.

Travel-book icon objects to gun-toting protesters

Hinting at a national boycott of Arizona, travel guru Arthur Frommer said he won't be making any trips to the Grand Canyon State after a group of protesters openly displayed firearms outside the building where President Barack Obama gave a speech in Phoenix this week.

Arizona law allows most adults to bear arms in public.

Frommer said he was "shocked beyond measure" by the gun-toting "thugs" and "extremists," including a man with an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle who said he was exercising his Second Amendment rights.

"For myself, without yet suggesting that others follow me in an open boycott, I will not personally travel in a state where civilians carry loaded weapons onto the sidewalks and as a means of political protest," the founder of the popular Frommer's collection of budget-travel guides wrote on his blog on Frommers.com.

"I not only believe such practices are a threat to the future of our democracy, but I am firmly convinced that they would also endanger my own personal safety there," Frommer added. "And therefore I will cancel any plans to vacation or otherwise visit in Arizona until I learn more. And I will begin thinking about whether tourists should safeguard themselves by avoiding stays in Arizona."

Frommer is an influential voice in the travel world, having launched his eponymous guidebook company in 1957. Though he sold his business in 1977, he has continued to blog for Frommer's and is a consultant to parent and global-publishing group Wiley.

<SNIP>

http://www.azcentral.com/business/articles/2009/08/21/20090821biz-frommer0821.html

this place was always a little bit wacko, but I thought when we got a Dem governor maybe thins would turn around a little bit. Well, Obama took our Dem governor and left us with all the nut jobs.

I wouldn't recommend Arizona as a tourist stop either.



Tansy Gold, who isn't quite in Raúl Grijalva's district but maybe with redistricting in the future. . . . . .

I posted this to my Facebook page.

Just because they can then the likes of Dan Quayle a current Arizona resident should practice what they preach.

Probably too chicken to do that.

I love Arizona. I hate yahoos with guns outside a presidential event.

I just don't want to particularly be around them.

are using them as prosthetic devices.

only obvious.

men who brag about guns have small d-cks

Most states have open carry laws similar to Arizona.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-02-11-guns_N.htm As you can see only 6 states don't allow 'open carry' of guns. Of those six, four are considering allowing open carry. That will leave only New York and Florida as states to go to by people who are "afraid" of citizens with guns.

to political protests is new, but probably inevitable.

People who are "afraid" of citizens with guns is a very odd way to put it.
We are to trust that everyone who might legally carry would never use that gun to shoot someone who just pisses them off?
Short tempers, anger, poor impulse control and so on do not go well with guns.

Open carry and concealed carry laws are on the books in 48 states. There are no examples of people who have a legal right to possess weapons having problems with "short tempers" and "poor impulse" control and shooting people they were pissed off at. Those who don't have a legal right to carry aren't affected by the laws since they only apply to people with the legal right to carry (felons for example do not have the legal right). I just returned from spending some time in Israel. There you will see teenagers going into bars and fast food places with automatic weapons and rifles. Teenagers are not known for having great impulse control or even tempers yet they don't shoot each other just because someone has pissed them off. I don't think we are that much different.

regardless of what the law may say. IMHO, anybody who feels the need to open carry to a townhall or any other such event is nothing short of a COWARD.

But some people crave attention or just want to make some sort of point. I don't think personal bravery or cowardice has much to do with it.

i can get on board with the attention-seeking aspect.

find this open display of gun threats against the President, Disgusting and Dangerous!

Imagine the good karma that it is someone with influence in the travel world.

in bars! Can you imagine a couple of these assholes after a few shots of Jack Daniels?

I bet Brewer could care less who boycotts Az - just don't mess with guns.

I am so embarrassed to live here :(

omg.

Ya know - I really thought things were looking bluer in Az - now I'm not so sure.
What we need more than anything in this state is to change the state legislator, and get rid of this idiots - like Pearce.
And of course Brewer.

The guns in bars thing got passed in the legislature. Brewer signed it last month.

But if posting misinformation makes a better story, I hope you enjoy the reactions you get.

Open carry is legal almost everywhere, including California.