2nd Amendment Protest Rallies (and sure, we sold a house on Friday).

We sold ol' Farm 56 yesterday to clients who were with us before the house started, meaning we paired the house, land, budget, timing and client together in a package, wrapped it up with a bow, and delivered it on time 6 or so months later.

It's what we do, so sometimes the true talent it takes is overlooked.  First, we have to scout good land at great prices.  2nd, we have to find client, which we do mostly on our own without the help of the real estate community, 3rd, we have to pair a home that matches the budget of the client as well as the space and flow, 4, we have to ensure that house works on that piece of land, since some lands supports a wide range of land plots, other don't and call for something specific, 5, we have to collaborate successfully with these clients we know little about, typically juggling 14 or more houses at a time, 6, we have to build these homes within the framework of the ultimate appraisal since our word to our clients is that we build things that have value in marketplace, 7, we need strong cash flow and lending capacity since besides the deposit, we pay for all the building and improvement and then when it is finished, appliances on, Certificate of Occupancy issued, board of health hurdled - we sell it, like any other finished home, to the client we had attained 6+ months earlier.

It's one thing to design/build.   It's quite another to 'land scout/acquire client/design/build/finance/sell'.  It's tricky and no other company, literally no other company regionally does what we do.  It just takes to much discipline talent and while there are a lot of talented people out there, most of them can't wear multiple hats - they are good at what they are good at, and that's where it ends.

Now that I got the point of the blog out there - Catskill Farms' stuff- let me digress to the events of the day.  I was just saying 2 weeks ago that if there ever was a time to test the gun rights people's seriousness about the 2nd amendment, and why we all need guns all the time everywhere, this is the time.  With broad, never seen before, actions of State and Federal government to shut down a broad array of constitutionally protected activities - work, assembly, freedom to worship, prosper, gather - if there ever was a time for that pure strict constitutional interpretation of the 2nd amendment - to form militia to protects one's rights against government overreach, that time is now.

I'm not a gun owner, so I'm not too wired in to those insane extrapolations of interpretations of how the 2nd amendment of 250 years ago when electricity didn't exist and guns shot one round - followed by a 45 second reload process - then shot another, somehow supported any type of gun ownership anywhere, anytime.

But how often have we dismissed as completely unimaginable the need for a militia, discarded those arguments because the unlikely need to stand up to government overreach.

Yet, here we are - in the most black and white example of a government using their power to trample and extinguish freedoms that are assumed and basic to our understanding of the covenant between our government and us.  It's clear this need for a militia seemed far-fetch because we have allowed such an all-pervasive control of our lives by the government that the idea of the government overreaching to a degree we would actually care about seemed far-fetched.

But here we are, losing our jobs, families, education, worship, way of life, because of decisions the government is making, so yes, if we are talking about the basic rights granted to us by the founding document we celebrate, we have every right to push back.

My thought is that these State governments better be using the April 1 - May 15 time period where they shut down the country to come up with a real plan, industry by industry, to open up, with real enforceable rules and real reasons why one industry can be open and another can't.

Until someone can explain to me why McDonalds and Burger King are essential (and show me how low wage workers, untested for the virus, making food, exchanging money, passing out hundreds of thousands of food bags, food wrappers, drinks to a long stream of untested auto occupants are somehow safe and free of disease) - when someone can show me why fast food is essential, and not single family non-urban residential construction where we work outside, with the same people everyday, and provide a broad array of support to a broad array of industries and families - until these governors start getting serious about who wins and who loses, with credible explanations, then I'm starting to lean on the side that legitimate, constitutionally protected protest, is a very viable action for patriots to take.
(Amended - NOW GOLF COURSES ARE OPEN, WTF!)

Funny how this seems right wing - which I'm not in anyway-, since the right wing has bastardized this argument for much lesser causes, but in this case, it really goes to the heart of what it means to be an American citizen, promised certain rights.

Asidedly, how could actually engineer a better way to take control of a society?  If they didn't know how to do it before, we certainly have a road map now of how to control the minions and sheep that constitute our citizenry.

I don't disagree with what's been done on a dime thus far, but their thinking is going to need be more surgical and much less blunt hammer to maintain control and consensus.   It's not radical to accept the damage being done in the name of the virus is outdoing the virus itself.  And if your mind is not too rigid, you can actual express the above sentiment without disagreeing with any State action that has been do to date - but, that mandate and acquiescence to such extreme State power has a short leash, IMHO.