… even though it is your right to do so
as a red-blooded American citizen!

Police in the great state of Kansas, home to that Dorothy and her little dog, Toto, have issued a plea for residents to stop discharging their firearms in the direction of the tornadoes that swirl through the Plains on an almost-hourly basis.

Heaven knows, your Humble Squire has been tempted to pump a few rounds into the rain clouds that have been hovering over Stately Blaska Manor these last 349 days-straight like Al Capp’s Joe Btfsplk. (Gol darn clouds! Take that you bastids! BAAP! BAAP! BAAP!)

Apparently, the good people of WW2 hero Bob Dole’s home state feel the same way. Police in Lawrence KS, home to either the University of Kansas or Kansas State (I’m too busy loading to look it up) issued this advisory:

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We learned about this practice from the Hon. Brian Schimming while gabbing on Ms. Vicki McKenna’s most excellent radio program yesterday afternoon (06-18-19). (This Schimming fellow gets around. Plus, he knows stuff.)

Matter of time before Madison Police Chief Mike Koval follows suit with his own advisory; the Madison Common Council will draft an ordinance; and the TV stations will broadcast an icon of a twister and a rifle with the international “Don’t Even Think About It” logo. Even so, I would not want to be the twister that passes through the Deerfield Rod & Gun Club.

We learn of this latest crimp in our constitutional liberties from a website newly bookmarked here at the Policy Werkes. It’s called “Rare.” Rare makes the case that “Guns are tools for self-defense. Tornadoes threaten people’s safety. Ipso facto, it’s totally fine to shoot guns at tornadoes.”

Unassailable, that. Even the Notorious RBG would concur with that opinion. But because something is legal and the right of the citizenry does not make it sound practice. Like roller skating in a buffalo herd. Don’t do it.

The website Rare observes:

In reality, firing your gun at a tornado is a terrible idea. Here’s a quick rundown of what will happen if you decide to walk outside and start pumping rounds into a cyclone.

• The tornado will hurl a brick or tractor or jagged piece of telephone pole at you.

• You’ll die.

• The tornado will pick up your gun.

• The tornado will start firing your gun at everything it passes.

• Your county is now under attack by both a tornado and an active shooter.

The Policy Werkes would add one final (ahem) bullet point:

• You might hit a cow.

Based on our observance of the science class film strip “Twister,” cows are often involved in tornadoes. (Yes, the plural of tornado can take either an -es or just an -s.)