Nova Zeelandia

With the recent passage of HB116 through congress in the great state of Utah, I've been thinking of what I can/will do if the nation I've called home all my life goes straight to hell in a hand basket. I love the United States of America, but with the recent infections of liberalism into our political philosophy, I fear the end may come in my lifetime. I won't go into great detail, since I already have in this blag, but the purpose of a government is to protect the rights and welfare of its citizens even if that means denying those same rights to non-citizens.

Before we get too far into this, allow me to express that I do recognize the irony of emigrating from a country because it has too loose of immigration policies. I can appreciate immigration in many instances. However, these instances always involve the immigrant holding some skill or asset that would be valuable to the receiving nation, not just because they feel sorry for him or her. Additionally, I believe that all immigrants should be required to meet strict language standards before immigrating.

In the recent past, I've contemplated immigrating to Switzerland if things really started to suck in the United. Since I speak French, I would have probably moved to the Geneva area and tried to learn what German I could while I was there. Switzerland has, until recently, been a fairly prosperous and homogeneous nation that had some of the most relaxed gun control measures on the earth. However, recently, Switzerland has fallen victim to the same liberal ideals that are infecting the United States. Switzerland has allowed an influx of immigrants from both north Africa and the Balkans. Naturally, this has led to increased pressure to enact gun control measures and has made Switzerland no different, and possibly even worse off than the US in this respect.

I have also been contemplating another option: New Zealand. New Zealand has a fairly strict immigration policy that requires prospective immigrants to provide something to the country. This can come in the form of a skill that is in shortage in New Zealand (like civil engineering) or in straight-up cash. With the recent quake that rocked Christchurch, and the associated geotechnical damage that went along with it, I feel pretty confident that I could offer a useful skill to the country of New Zealand. They also require a strict set of English standards that require all prospective immigrants to actually be conversational in English before moving in. The country is also pretty well homogeneous, with about 70% of its residents being of European decent, the approximately 25% of Asians and Polynesians assimilating very well, and the remaining 5% being either multi-racial or identifying simply as "New Zealander." New Zealand strikes me as a country that is well united across cultures as opposed to one this is divided by them. Additionally, as trivial as it is, the political parties are correctly colored in my mind. The National (conservative) party is blue and the Labour (liberal) party is red. Ever since I started going to BYU, I've been conflicted around election day when I was looking for states to light up red.

Now for the bad news. There are a few things about New Zealand that I just wouldn't like. First of all they drive on the wrong side of the road. I really wouldn't want to relearn how to drive just because Kiwis decided to follow Britain and drive on the wrong side. Also, like most of the rest of the world, they use the metric system. As I've mentioned on this blag before, I really don't like the metric system and I don't think I'd ever really get used to using it. On a slightly more serious note, New Zealand has some pretty serious gun control going on, even though they're probably on the lighter half of the world scheme. Pretty much any hunting rifle or shotgun would be legal to own without any sort of permit. However, pistols are only allowed to be used in government-approved shooting clubs and must have a barrel of about 4 inches (10 centimeters) or longer. Also, any gun that can accept a magazine that holds more than 7 rounds requires a police-issued permit. You know how many permits the police are issuing these days? A big, fat goose egg, zero. This functionally outlaws any sort of assault-style weapon. On the whole, I'm not a big fan of New Zealand's gun control laws.

At the end of the day, things are moving in a progressivist direction in the United States, but they aren't that bad just yet. The gun control laws in this country would have to get a whole lot worse to cause me to want to move to any other country. I love this country too much to leave it for a minor infraction of my personal political philosophy. However, I believe this country is headed in the wrong direction and if it continues in that direction, I might just be headed to New Zealand or some other country that I find suitable.

Now for some good, old-fashioned entertainment. Caution: this video does contain a pair of expletives.

2 things

Thing #1:

If you, from henceforth, hear me say that I've never won anything in my life, I want you to punch me in the mouth, because now I have. :) Last Friday (July 10th for anyone who's keeping track), my mother had a doctor's appointment on which I accompanied her. While she was doing her thing in the back room, I picked up a copy of the day's Denver Post Sports Section and read it from front page to back, seeing as there was not anything else to do. In the course of reading this paper, I found a small ad in the bottom right corner of a page that said, "Text 'ROCKIES' and you zip code to (number) to win a family four pack of tickets to the Rockies game on July 11th." And yes, July 11th is my birthday for anyone who's keeping track. I thought I might have a good chance to win because, seriously, how many people who read hard copies of newspapers actually text as well? Apparently the odds were pretty good because I won 4 tickets to the Rockies game on my birthday against the Atlanta Braves.

We went to the game, and the luxury suite in which we got to sit was pimpin'. They had all sorts of ballpark food, drinks and a sweet bar-style table off of which I ate while watching the game. It would have been just about perfect if Jason Marquis (Rockies' starting pitcher) had had a better night. He gave up 3 runs pretty quickly, and the Rockies ended up losing 4-3. Despite the loss, I still look back on it fondly as the only thing I've ever won... and on my birthday too.

Thing #2:

So, recently I've been looking into acquiring for myself a handgun, seeing as my 21st birthday has recently passed. I've always had quite an affinity for Glocks, and had it narrowed down to either the model 17 (full-size) or model 19 (compact) 9mm handguns. I perused galleryofguns.com 's "Gun Genie" and found that they had in excess of 100 model 17s available and a few model 19s. Upon further inspection, I found that the model 19s were all faggy California models which held only 10 rounds plus 1. At that point, the decision was made and tonight, I put down a deposit on a brand new Glock model 17, and within a week, I should be holding it in my hands.

Let's review some of the reasons that I have such an affinity for this sort of firearm. The first reason is that it's just plain sexy. When I think of handguns, the Glock models are just what come to mind. This is just the way that a pistol should look. A squarish slide, internal hammer, barrel flush with the slide at the front, a perfect balance of ergonomics and flash, and a picatanny rail on the front end of the frame are just a few of these guns' schmexy features. Additionally, let talk about safeties. In my years of shooting, I've developed quite a dislike for most safeties. Most of them are just inadequate pieces of $h*7 that just get in the way of the trigger and keep it from being pulled. They don't work when you want them to, and work flawlessly when you're trying to take the shot of a lifetime. The bottom line: Most active safeties blow. The Glock, on the other hand has 3, count them three, T-H-R-E-E, 3 PASSIVE... let me say it again, passive safeties, which means that I can reap all the benefits of an active safety, more reliably and without even thinking about it.

At this point I might just sound like a walking Glock commercial, but dang, I am so freakin' excited to get my hands on this pistol. It's gonna be a blast. :)