Back from Jan 3rd Washington DC (solo) Demonstration

Back from Washington two o’clock this morning. I stood outside the Longworth House yesterday, Jan. 3rd, with my sign until about 12:45pm when the lines started dying down. Longworth is one of the buildings where the House of Representatives have their offices.

Good news was that there were tons of people, and long lines, in Washington for the swearing in of the new members so my signs got plenty of attention.  The bad news and sad news is nobody else showed up to demonstrate so I’m sure I looked pretty weak, number wise. But personally I felt pretty damn good standing up to the tyrants. 

After I left the Longworth House I headed over to the Senate side of the Capitol to hand deliver my letter to the Senators. I only got to print out thirteen before I left for Wasington DC. They were two pages (legal size) long and my printer wasn’t working right, so I had to print on best quality to make it all legible and it took forever. Anyway I delivered them to eleven republicans and two democrats.

The democrats were Joe Manchin and Dianne Feinstein.

The republicans were: Kelly Ayotte,  John Barrasso, Tom Coburn,  Micheal Enzi, Lindsey Graham, Chuck Grassley, Joe Hoeven, John McCain, Mitch McConnel, Rand Paul, and Marco Rubio.

To tell you the truth, I hesitated (yes, from fear of retaliation) for awhile outside of Feinstein’s office because it is pretty obvious the letter was about her and her proposal. But then I started thinking about the Jefferson quote: “When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny.” And I’ve been preaching to people lately about speaking without fear, so there was no way I could back off now. It would’ve been too big a setback and way too hypocritical.

Because none of the Senators were available, (it was swearing in day) when I handed in the letter in I asked each of their staff (except Feinstein) if they knew how the Senator felt about Feinstein’s ban proposal; specifically the part limiting magazine capacity and banning semis.

They all (except Graham) basically said the Senator defends the 2nd Amendment, but as of now has no official statement on the specifics of Feinstein’s proposal. McConnel’s office added that without an actual bill being submitted he doesn’t know what’s in it to respond to. Graham’s office said he already appeared on Piers Morgan and said they have to amend the Constitution if they want change the 2nd Amendment.

So in the end I didn’t save America, and I never will without your help, but I sure as hell am more proud of myself today than yesterday.

*NOTE* I didn’t take notes, so I am only paraphrasing Senate staff members.

Tom Maerling
1/4/2013