newspaper publishing of carry permit list

[ccaptn]

Re: Memphis Commercial Appeal lowlifes publishing the TN gun carry permit list

I'm a new TFA member, so don't know my way around the TFA website yet. This may not be the best place for this posting, but I figure it can't hurt. Likewise, i'm sure this subject has been hashed and re-hashed in many other posts. Still, I will add my 2 cents worth. The following is why I don't want anyone, let alone some arrogant ignoramuses at a newspaper, publishing my personal information or that of any of my fellow Tennesseans. I sent this to the Commercial Appeal, to Mike Fleming, and to Thomas Hargrove of Scripps Howard News who had an article on this subject in the CA on 3/3/09.

March 1, 2009

To: Mike Fleming, AM 600 Radio, mike@600wrec.com

Re: CA publication of the Tennessee gun carry permit list

Mike,

I would like to comment and reply to a particular ignoranus who called your radio show a few days ago regarding the issue with the local leftist rag newspaper, aka the Memphis commercial appeal which has published the personal information of 218,811 (as of 2/27/09) Tennessee gun carry permit holders on their website:

http://www.commercialappeal.com/data/gunpermits/

In his ignorant wisdom, obviously thinking he was making a very clever point, the caller kept asking the question: "Tell me (Mike), what harm has been done by publishing the personal information of Tennessee gun carry permit holders?". Well, I have a simple exercise for him that will enable him to answer his own imbecilic question, as follows:

1. Take out a clean white (or color of your choice) sheet of paper.

2. On the paper, write down your name, address, date-of-birth, phone number and any other personal information about yourself that is nobody else's business that you would like everyone else to know. Be sure to include your Tennessee Drivers License number, since that is the same as the gun carry permit number on the list published by the commercial appeal.

3. Now, make 52 copies of your personal information sheet, for starters.

4. Each week, put a copy of your personal information marked "To Whom It Does Not Concern" on the top of the pile of your trash for garbage pickup. Make it easy, don't crumple it up.

5. Make additional copies of your personal information. You will need a lot of them for this exercise.

6. Now, every time you go to Walmart, Wendys, McDonalds, Autozone, Gus's Fried Chicken, the grocery store, a restaurant, a gas station, to the library -in fact anywhere- when you enter the establishment, casually drop some of your personal information sheets off at the counter and on the floor and leave them.

7. Now that you get the picture, you can come up with your own creative ideas to distribute your very own personal information. Some suggestions: drive around town and put one in every mailbox. Get the ca newspaper to add it as a flyer in the Sunday paper. Mail it to everyone in the Memphis phone book, then do the same for all other cities. Put it on billboards around Memphis, then in all other cities. Email your personal information to friends, family, and strangers and ask them to forward it as a chain letter. If you do this right, it will take a lot of time. In fact, you will probably need to quit your job to devote full time to it.

Once you have completed the above exercise, we are now ready to answer your idiot question, "What harm has been done?". The answer is -drum roll please- absolutely no harm whatsoever has been done!! That was your clever trick question for Mike Fleming, was it not?! He doesn't have a crystal ball any more than you do. So far as anyone knows, no harm has been done... not until someone decides to use your personal information by robbing your home, stealing your identity, or in some other as-yet- unknown way by exploiting your personal information against you.

Maybe nothing will happen to you today, tomorrow, next week, next year, or ever. Good for you. Or maybe something will happen in the future and you will have no clue that it happened because you or the ca published your personal information. And unfortunately you will not be able to sue the ca for damages because you will not be able to prove it. You don't know what, when, or where something may happen due to millions of people having your private information.

Odds are, in Memphis, that you will -sooner or later- be a victim of a random crime. Or maybe not so random. Paranoia you say? Identity theft, robbery, and other crimes happen every day. Just listen to the radio or watch tv. The only reason you were spared this time is that you were not them. But your turn is coming. You just don't know how you -as a victim- will be selected. Maybe random, maybe not.

You may STILL be a victim of crime, BUT IT WILL NOT BE BECAUSE THE CRIMINALS HAVE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION, IF THEY DO NOT HAVE IT! That possibility is eliminated, n'est-ce pas? You can personally take whatever risk you want with your own personal information. That is ok with me. You have my permission. But I don't want a moron like you giving out my personal information and I promise the same regard for your privacy. Likewise, I don't want the ca rag publishing my personal information or that of 218,811 of my fellow Tennesseeans with or without my permission, especially to millions of users of the Internet, in America, and all over the world. There is no risk to NOT revealing your personal information, but -once the genie is out of the bottle- there is an unknown, non-zero possible risk to you and your family from that day forward that any criminals, identity thieves, or anti-Second-Amendment, gun-control zealots may use your own information against you.

If you are still following along here, there is an additional example of the security value of information that may be enlightening. Have you ever heard of the Pakistani scientist, the nuclear expert who has widely distributed detailed nuclear secrets? We may ask your supposed rhetorical question: "What possible harm has been done?" And again, the cleverly-implied answer that you were expecting from Mike Fleming is "None.". And that will be true, in the academic sense of elementary logic... up to the point in time that an atomic bomb goes off in an American city due to the "harmless" information about how to make an atomic bomb that has been published for all terrorists to use. Then we will be able to answer your question in detail, unless of course, it happens in Memphis.

Do you get it yet? If you have followed the above steps, you have now answered your own moronic question! But there is no need to go to all that trouble to publicize your personal information! If you have a Tennessee gun carry permit, the ca -in their arrogant wisdom- have already done it for you!

Regards,

Paul Poole,
One Citizen,
A Proud Non-Hyphenated American

P.S. Who needs newspapers when you can get real news on the Internet.