(Knox Henry, WW II Veteran, is notified he is the new mayor of Athens, TN. 1946. Photo AP)

I was shaking my head over the news this morning. Apparently the Taliban Wing of the Republican Party triumphed in the party primaries in two of our more eccentric States. More power to them; Mitt still took more delegates than Rick or Newt, so until I hear otherwise, I think he is the one to take on The One.

Should be an interesting summer and fall, but there is going to be a lot going on out in the country.

The Russians are coming. Boris and Natasha put a contract on the property next door to Refuge Farm. Natasha announced that the next steps are the inspections and the appraisal. That could only give her more leverage against the seller and work to their advantage. The current owner has had the place on the market for six months without a taker, so this is a great thing.

I am thrilled- it is going to be very cool to have people I know and trust on the other side of the fence rather than a renter with a meth lab.

Natasha sent me a note saying “I didn’t think she had been serious.”

I wrote back and said “the East is Red!” and that I was thinking about re-christening my place “Kaliningrad.”

She said she was going to tell Boris that an appropriate name for her dacha was going to be “Proportional Response.”

I remember it as what we called “analogous response,” which was a tit-for-tat bit of nuclear brinksmanship by the Reagan Administration against the Kremlin over intermediate-range missiles. It provided one of the strangest professional days of my life, and nuclear submarines in all sorts of unusual places. I mean, when you go to work contemplated first strike issues and the problem of unambiguous warning without proof by dual-phenomenology verification, you know you are in terra incognita.

I am wondering if this is the start of an arms race?

Speaking of which, I lost track of the big Spring gun show that features hundreds of dealers at the Dulles Expo Center out in the wilds of Fairfax (or Loudoun?) Counties. I went to a few over the last couple years, but it is the strangest place to visit in America, with the possible exception of Wyoming.

I have decided I don’t like going unless I have a requirement, which I think I completed with the little .22 automatic that enables me to practice without pouring beaucoup bucks into the larger (and much more expensive) ammunition. I may have to rethink that.

My agents report that the place was a madhouse: the vast lot was filled with cars and they could not get close enough to park without a major hike. The trek to the building revealed people putting purchases in the trunk, and turning around to go back in to make more purchases.

The Gun Show appeared to be a land-office business. Add to that a wonderful (but quite surreal) video clip I got from my Left Coast Girlfriend, who forwards some interesting things. This one is apparently a trailer for a Hollywood production about the “Battle of Athens,” an obscure but electrifying revolt against corruption conducted by WW II Vets who mobilized against electoral fraud:

http://voxvocispublicus.homestead.com/Battle-of-Athens.html <http://voxvocispublicus.homestead.com/Battle-of-Athens.html%C2%A0> ;

I was so intrigued by the events in the trailer that I did some research. There is commentary about the revolt in the national press by no less a luminary than Eleanor Roosevelt. There are also accounts of other insurrections, and a minute-by-minute account of the battle. You can find it yourself at this link:

http://constitution.org/mil/tn/batathen_press.htm <http://constitution.org/mil/tn/batathen_press.htm>

It is fascinating, though I am also not quite sure what to think about it. Certainly it has a strong Second Amendment flavor, and clear reference to the First, and the loud-and-clear message that sometimes armed rebellion is necessary to preserve liberty.

The dramatized version is not a bad depiction of the real and harrowing events down in McMinn County, Tennessee. Obviously the folks at the Dulles Expo Center would agree with them. I sided with the Vets, of course, against the corrupt and abusive local government.

Still, it strikes me that if the Occupy Whatever movement started to exercise their own Second Amendment Rights I would not be that happy about it. I had my sons at the range a few years ago and there were two guys who had gang-banger ink showing blazing away.

“Takes all kinds,” I explained. “The Constitution says so.” The boys looked at me with curiosity.

I dunno. Do you?

Copyright 2012 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com