What do Mr. Stoner and Mr. Glock have in common? A lot actually, at least in Minnesota. On Wednesday, I went on my yearly field trip to the police station, to fill out a long form… Truly long, it makes a 4473 look short and sweet. I had to sign away my medical privacy rights, and a whole bunch of other stuff. Swear up and down and side to side that I was a law abiding citizen and swear some more as to my current address and whether or not I’d moved in the past five years and if I had I needed to list all the addresses. About the only thing I didn’t have to give them was a blood sample and, this changed a year or two ago, no more social security number needed.
So what do Mr. Stoner and Mr. Glock have in common? Here, in Minnesota, one needs a permit, issued by the closest law enforcement agency (if you live in a town, your police department, if you live out in the country, outside of town limits, the sheriff’s office) to buy a pistol or, and they don’t tell you this until you go to a gun store and try to buy one of Mr. Stoner’s weapon systems, you need the permit to purchase a pistol, in order to purchase an AR15… But, a “non scary” long gun, either rifle or shotgun, one doesn’t need said permit to purchase. Are you confused? Imagine how I felt 10 or 11 years ago the first time.
Even the permit itself, imagine two business cards, attached together along the long side and folded, doesn’t say anything about it being needed to purchase a “scary” Mr. Stoner creation, only pistols. (Such as those dreaded black Glocks!)
After I turned 21 or 22, and filled out the application for my first permit, the woman who works the desk, (I’ve seen her every year since, except once, they had a filler), told me, the permit would be mailed to me in 3-5 days. A few years later, that changed to 7 days. Then later 7 to 10 business days, which has been what she’s said the past few years.
Yesterday, guess what she told me? “Once all this gets approved the permit will be mailed to you in 10 to 30 days.” I remained polite and cordial, though my blood was boiling inside. She’s usually very nice, perky, pleasant, all smiles. Today, she was strictly business. I’m not sure if she’s a cop or just an employee.
But “10 to 30 days”, now that was a shocker.
I always keep my permit to purchase current, since, my only real passion is shooting, so, I want to be able to buy any gun I may either know I want, or accidentally stumble across at the gun store without delay. But a right delayed is a right denied. And these permits are only good for one year.
I’ve heard, people with concealed carry permits, can use them in lieu of a permit to purchase. But I’m not sure about that. What is certain, is that no one in Minnesota has rectified the permission slip issue. When concealed carry permits first became law here, the GOP did that. Yet they failed to eliminate the permission slip to purchase. I suppose that makes sense in their weak little minds, if they thought you needed a permission slip to carry a pistol concealed. Open carry is allowed without a concealed carry permit only in a few instances, such as,
But I detest permission slips. Any violation of the Second Amendment is unforgivable. I’m willing to compromise on a lot, politically, but not the Second Amendment. If my choice is between a raging jackass and a pea brained milquetoast elephant, I’ll write in ‘John Wayne’ or ‘Theodore Roosevelt’.
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