\n\nI believe in America and in Americans. I take second place to no one in love for my country. The Sikh speakers, especially the President of the temple, exceeded me in patriotism by a long shot. America is not blood, and it\u00e2\u0080\u0099s not soil. America is ideas, and the people who believe them. These were Americans. They might have been born here or\u00c2\u00a0far away. But\u00c2\u00a0once they started talking about America, the \u00e2\u0080\u009cbest\u00e2\u0080\u009d and \u00e2\u0080\u009csafest country in the world\u00e2\u0080\u009d, you could tell that they were Americans. These are not scare quotes, these are direct quotes from the speakers. Thomas Jefferson might have had a problem understanding the accents, but not the sentiments.
\nAnd now for the funny part. There must be\u00c2\u00a0some sort of gun enthusiast radar. I don\u00e2\u0080\u0099t know if they found me or I found them, but we found each other. The guys I was sitting next to were both\u00c2\u00a0Sikh\u00c2\u00a0and gun owners.\u00c2\u00a0We talked about guns, and we\u00e2\u0080\u0099ll be getting together sometime soon to go shooting. One of my new friends said that he was surprised\u00c2\u00a0that no one in the Temple shot at the intruder. He was mystified\u00c2\u00a0as to why there was no one with a gun available to shoot back. He assured me that it was almost certain that there were concealed\u00c2\u00a0carriers in the congregation. I did not go to the temple to advocate for concealed carry. I was, however, treated to a discussion of how banning guns would not change anything. I was told that criminals would get guns no matter what the laws, and that taking guns from the honest people would only make things worse. In short, it was a discussion pretty much like any that you would read on any pro-gun blog.
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via I had lunch with my fellow Americans today | An NC Gun BlogAn NC Gun Blog.
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