Fort Lee hates bile (seriously)
Posted on May 14th, 2008 by xyz Categories and Tags: Fort Lee, New Jersey, 2nd Amendment, Antonio Musumeci, bureaucracy, Fort Lee, Fort Lee Police Dept, guns, your rightsI receive a phone call from a number I didn’t recognize around noon today.
I usually don’t answer unknowns, as they tend to end with me struggling to explain to Spanish-speaking Texans that they’ve dialed the wrong number.
This was my conversation, to the best of my memory:
Me: Hello?
Caller: Um, yes. Is this Laurie Par-a-vati?
Me: Speaking.
Caller: Yes, hi. This is Officer (inaudible) from the Fort Lee Police Dept.
Me: Oh, hi. (I immediately try to remember if I missed paying a parking ticket or something)
Officer: Yes, you submitted a reference letter for an Antonio Musumeci. Did I pronounce that correctly?
Me: Close enough, and yes I did.
Officer: For a fire arm permit.
Me: On, yes! (possibly a little too eager)
Officer: (long pause) I’m not sure if you completely understood what you were supposed to write on the reference form.
Me: What do you mean?
Officer: Well, (sympathetic pause) in the section where you’re supposed to explain why you think Antonio should get a fire arm, you wrote ‘because he wants one’ and ‘it’s his 2nd Amendment Right’.
Me: Yeah. Is there someth–
Officer: I always say these papers aren’t clear enough.
Me: …
Officer: Well, (pause) we aren’t really concerned with your opinion on gun control. I mean, if you look at the news, just giving someone a gun because they want one really hasn’t worked out well.
Me: (I opt to bite my tongue instead of getting into a blog of bile discussion) Oh, yea, I watch the news. I mean…
Officer: What this is suppose to serve is (pause), a moment to sort of vouch for Mr. Antonio. Tell us briefly why you think he should get a firearm. I figured you probably didn’t understand the intention of that section.
Me: I see. Because I figured, since Fort Lee already issued him a firearm.
Officer: (pause) Yes, well, you know. If you look at the news, just giving someone a gun because they want one really doesn’t work out well. If you watch the news (nervous laugh) you’ll see this.
Me: Oh, okay. Right.
Officer: Well, if you are serious about being his point of contact…
Me: Can you send me another one then?
Officer: We’ll send you another form, and just briefly explain if you think he is capable of owning a firearm.
Me: No problem. Thank you.
Officer: Have a nice day.
I want to throw this out there: the officer was not being a jerk. He stuttered, was really trying to be polite, and almost sounded like he was expecting me to get confrontational with him.
So am I surprised that my comments got me a phone call? Yes and no. I knew what they wanted to read was most definitely not what I wrote, that’s for damn sure. But the fact that they actually took the bait, wasted the time to call me, have this conversation, and to resend the reference letter annoys me a bit. Sure, now I have blog of bile subject matter to post about, but at the expense of bile’s firearm license waiting period. I guess the new game is seeing how long it will take them to mail out the blank form again.
Moral of the story? The 2nd Amendment is not a good enough reason for wanting a firearm.
2 Responses to “Fort Lee hates bile (seriously)”
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May 15th, 2008 at 8:46 am
If it is a right and not a privilege, instead of asking why should the person have a gun, they should ask you why shouldn’t the person get the gun. I would have been so tempted to ask the officer, "You know, the gov’t is slowly but surely taking away our Constitutional rights, ::chuckle:: don’t you watch the news?"
May 15th, 2008 at 10:18 am
You and me both. It’s really a good thing they didn’t call me about this. I would never have seen that permit. Not that I doubt I still may never see it.