In The City (My The City):

Blount Countians voted strongly against a half-cent sales tax increase Tuesday.

The countywide referendum was defeated by nearly 13,000 votes with 30,871 people voting against it and 18,124 people supporting it, according to unofficial returns.

Good.

Past coverage here.

In The City (My The City), a local man had $34,750 worth of guns stolen:

A Maryville gun collector came home Wednesday to find someone had burglarized his residence and stolen about 100 guns which were valued at $34,750.

William Ellis Spurgeon, 4760 Sevierville Road, had been away from home since Sunday. When he returned at 11:08 a.m. Wednesday he noticed a sliding glass door located on the side of the house standing open, according to the police report.

After closer inspection, he noticed pry marks around the lock area of the door.

He immediately went to check on his gun collection, which was located in a closet in the basement of the house, which is located beside Spurgeon Greenhouses. He found about 100 guns missing, along with several boxes of ammunition.

A list of items the burglars made off with:

Guns stolen included Colt .45-caliber WWII commemoratives, Colt Detective Series, Cobra Action Scout .22-caliber, Colt Gold Spike, four .22-caliber derringers, Smith and Wesson .44-caliber Magnums with 6- and 8-inch barrels, six Smith and Wesson .351-caliber Magnums, two nickel-plated .44-caliber Magnum pistols with 6-inch barrels, Smith and Wesson .357-caliber Magnum Texas Ranger, bone handled pistols, Rouger .44-caliber Magnum Red Hawk Super, two .44-caliber nickel-plated black powder guns, a Winchester 30-30 John Wayne Rifle and a 30-30 President Roosevelt Rifle.

I early voted today. Usually when I early vote, I walk right in and right out. Today, there was a bit of a line. That could indicate higher turnout this election. Beats me.

Also, seems McCain/Palin finally got someone to put out some signs.

I’d tell you how I voted but you could probably guess.

Nothing too exciting to note except that, honestly, can we have paper ballots for those who want them? Folks over the age of 70 aren’t too good on these newfangled voting gizmos. And everyone else has to wait on them. Just sayin’.

It’s odd. But I tend to follow the local goings on in The City (My The City). But I had no idea there was a proposed 1/2% sales tax increase on the ballot. It is, of course, for the children^tm. I got spam in the mail from Blount Countians for Educational Excellence telling me I should support this tax increase for a variety of reasons, including that a lot of taxes are paid by out of towners anyway. And they’d get all the kids ponies. Ok, I made that last part up. They want to raise money for schools. Like they always do. For the children^tm. The city and county governments should live within their means. Instead of blowing millions for a Civic Arts Center that no one will use and should be considered a free gift from the taxpayers to Maryville College, they could have funded schools. Anyway, the answer is no.

Their membership list is veritable who’s who of local yokel good o’ boys and girls.

Reading the local paper daily, I had no idea this was on the ballet. I even searched and found a single letter to the editor.

I’d say Maryville.

This past weekend, The City (My The City) hosted the Foothills Fall Festival. We took the kids on Saturday and watched some live music featuring a bunch of country singers I’d never heard of and Billy Ray Cyrus, who I have heard of but only ever heard one song - and you know which one it is. It’s not that these weren’t big names it’s just that I don’t listen to country. It was a good time. Our kids’ first concert.

Then on Sunday, we left the kids with the in-laws and me and the Mrs. went at watched a bunch of country singers I’d never heard of and Kenny Rogers. At 70, that man is one Hell of an entertainer. And it helped that I’d actually heard some of his songs before.

And the food was awesome. Funnel cakes and big greasy burgers. Oh, and one place had ribbon fries that were to die for.

It was a good time.

I went to the local sheriff’s department to get my NFA item approved. I walked in. Made small talk. And it was signed on the spot.

Well, if one can be VP then one can open an adult business:

A woman has applied to locate a sexually-oriented business at 2642 U.S. 411 South in the city of Maryville, a move an adjacent business owner opposes.

This would be the first such business within the city limits.

Deborah Yantis wants to locate her business, Sunshine (sic) Video, closer to town, said Maryville Development Services Director John Jagger. Sunshine Video was previously located at the intersection of U.S. 411 South, Clover Hill Mill Road and Calderwood Highway in Blount County.

Looks like it’s under new ownership. You’ll recall the past owner’s issues with the local political machine.

I see where the paper in The City (My The City) now has comments.

In other news, we have a SWAT Team?

I knew they bought some ninja-mobile a bit back with their free federal money and all that.

Campfield hangs on.

Overbey defeats Finney. You’ll recall that in his time in the house Overbey crossed party lines to vote for Jimmy Naifeh as speaker of the house. Jimmy Naifeh, you’ll recall, is our lying speaker of the house who keeps abusing his power to kill pro-gun bills.

And it looks like the dirty pool paid off: Duggan beats Meares.

Various reports of misinformation at voting locations and alleged violence against folks in Blount County. Shameful.

This election should be an embarrassment for residents of Blount County.

There’s a pretty ugly local election for judge in my county. Apparently, the local papers have been pretty incompetent on the issue. Incompetent is one word. Partisan hacks would be another. But I digress.

Also, we have the battle of the douchebags. See, we got us a state senate race going on. The incumbent is Ramond Finney. Despite his tendency to be a bit embarrassing, he’s mostly harmless. And Finney does have the NRA endorsement.

His opponent is Doug Overbey, whose cheesy mug you see all over the city, my the city. Overbey is running on a conservative leadership platform and pointing out that he’s a lifelong Republican, 100% pro-life, and all second amendment rights.

Unfortunately, Doug Overbey lost all credibility on two of those claims when he crossed party lines to vote for Jimmy Naifeh as speaker of the house. Jimmy Naifeh, you’ll recall, is our lying speaker of the house who keeps abusing his power to kill pro-gun bills.

I’ll be voting Finney.

Reports that the Blount County Voice to be canceled?

Via some random clickity that started with this post from R. Neal, I discovered that my subdivision now is part of Google’s street views. Creepy. However, they still show a cow pasture where my house is on their satellite view.

Blount County Sheriff’s Office Detective James Wilson won the friendly little shooting competition:

The Blount County Sheriff’s Office will have bragging rights for the next year after taking home the police shootout trophy on Tuesday.

After a challenge was sent out to all local officers, 22 men and women came out to show off their shooting skills on Monday at Gunny’s Indoor Shooting Range, 2208 E. Broadway Ave., Maryville. They were each scored on marksmanship, shooting while moving and speed shooting.

Blount County Sheriff’s Office Detective James Wilson was named “top shooter” and won first place in the competition with his overall score in all three categories. Wilson also took first place in speed shooting.

I wish I could have made it. BTW, the competition was held at Gunny’s.

The Daily Times:

Any police officer — who isn’t a scaredy-cat — is invited to participate in a “Police Shootout” Monday at Gunny’s Indoor Shooting Range, 2208 E. Broadway Ave., Maryville. Co-owner David Perry sent out a a flyer inviting all officers to find out “who’s the best.”

The flyer also includes a challenge from Maryville Police Capt. Mike “Mad Dog” Johnston, who claims other local departments quit competing in shooting competitions in the mid-1990s because they “got tired of being beat by Maryville” Police Department. There was a loss of interest because ”it really wasn’t that much of a competition,” he taunted.

“My challenge is to come compete and see if you can take away the bragging rights for a year,” Johnston said.

Gunny’s website is here. I may have to check it out.

The city (my the city)’s local newspaper caught fire. Vandalism is suspected and there were recent layoffs.

Our local newspaper has some blogs now. I’ve read this sentence now like four times:

Today I spent an extra free thought time to consider knowing as I prepared to lead a discussion on ideas tonight.

They speak English in what?

People wonder why I prefer to remain pseudonymous (even though quite a few folks know who I am), this is one reason:

This is some real Mayberry shit over here, except Goober and Gomer are in charge and Earnest T. Bass is off leash and off his meds.

I’ve been doing this blogging thing for six years and I’ve never seen anything like it. The harassment of me and others at this site, threatening emails, invasion of my privacy, people showing up on my front porch, reporters and others trying to get me to “out” people — it’s a regular three-ring circus and you can’t tell which clowns to trust.

The worst I’ve had to deal with is a geography grad student who likes to use my name when he posts comments here. Oh and ATF. The latter were far more pleasant.

Update: Related thoughts on anonymity and blogging from a blogger who is not anonymous.

You don’t know how many times this happens to me. Someone is giving me directions somewhere. And they say something like take 129 South from 411. Or You know, where Old Niles Ferry crosses 129 South. And I’ll say Huh? No idea what you’re talking about. And then they’ll say something like You know, take 411. There’s a light by a Citgo station. Make a left there.

And then it hits me: They mean make a left at the porn store. And then I say Oh, you mean make a left at the porn store. They look at me perplexed, as if they never noticed it was there. And I usually say something like How can you miss it? It’s got signs like 30 feet tall that say X X X ADULT SUPERSTORE and ADULTS ONLY and until recently it was painted bright red?

You know, when I mention the porn store, I’m not saying that you go there. I’m just pointing out that it’s a big landmark and it’s impossible for you to not know that it is there. So, why are you acting that way? Are my fellow Maryvillians so uptight that they can’t even acknowledge the porn store?

Any way, it always cracks me up.

BTW, I’ve talked about our local porn store before and his fight with the local authorities. See posts here. Turns out, the old owner has sold it because now the big signs that say X X X ADULT SUPERSTORE now have NEW OWNER plastered on them. And the new owners put up siding and stone as opposed to the former bright red paint. It almost looks respectable. Or at least, less offensive.

After doing an article on Blogs, I noticed just now that our local newspaper now has an RSS feed. And this time, it works! From that RSS feed, we learn that:

The Daily Times has a space for community conversation. BlountCountyVoice.com puts you in the editor’s chair; you write about what’s important in your world and participate in discussions about topics of all shapes and sizes.

Daily Times reporters and editors are blogging at BlountCountyVoice.com along with many from around the community.

We’ve also begun relationships with several local bloggers to syndicate their content on our site. We include snippets from their blogs and provide a link to their sites from ours to help provide the bloggers in our community with additional exposure.

Excellent! Welcome to it. The still need to figure out this whole hyper linking thing, though.

There’s a shotgun club at the base of the Smoky Mountains for trap shooters. Seems the local busy-body contingent thinks that the lead from the range is bad for the local watershed and, of course, the noise is a problem. Another reason to remove the onerous regulations regarding sound suppressors and ammunition. After all, suppressors and some more environmentally friendly ammo would make everyone happy.

You can suppress shotguns, right?

Over at The Daily Times, they do a piece on blogs.

I think this is the second time they’ve used the word blog. But someone should tell them how to use hyperlinks in their stories. I mean, I had to google up Red Necks and White Socks — It’s Murville. It’s a local blog mentioned in the piece that I’d never heard of. And it’s also, apparently, not even local.

And they mention Blountviews, R. Neal’s other joint.

Update: Say, two of the more popular blogs originate in Blount County and we weren’t contacted?

Gunny’s is apparently open for business. And their website is much improved. So says an email I received.

So, Blount County Mayor Jerry Cunningham was blindsided that the local Rubbermaid plant decided to lay off 200 people. By blindsided, you’d think he meant shocked or concerned. But he’s more concerned because Rubbermaid didn’t tell him:

“I am very surprised that any company would have handled the manner in the way that this company chose,” he said in a press release.

“In the past, other companies, when they have even downsized, have had the courtesy to visit with the different governmental entities relative to these kinds of things inasmuch as it affects so many live,” he said.

Well, first of all Sparky, the local government did know because police were there when Rubbermaid fired everybody.

Look out! Bears.

This weekend, I was out driving around and I decided to stop by Gunny’s Indoor Shooting Range. It’s not open yet but there was plenty of activity with them finishing the place up and stuff. They gave me a tour of the facility and their range. They’ll have (IIRC) eight pistol lanes and four lanes rated for rifles up to 30-06. And they explained to me how the fancy ventilation system works. Seems breathing lead is bad for you and they have put in all kinds of filters and stuff for that. They told me the total cost of just the range was about half a million. Also, if you join now before they open, you get a membership at $80 off the regular price. Membership includes range time, one handgun carry permit class, and your first firearm purchase at cost. They were all super nice, friendly, and helpful. I mean, the guy stopped what he was doing and gave me a tour and I just walked in from the street.

But this ain’t a post about that. It’s a post about this: A man who I assume was The Gunny was talking to another guy, who we will refer to as SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED. SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED happened to stop by that day to and got a tour. I’m not sure how the conversation got to that point but I heard The Gunny say something like Well, you can’t really carry a loaded weapon through the store to the range. The Gunny explained that that was a condition of his insurance policy. Well, SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED got all SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED on The Gunny saying he thought it was ridiculous and he’d never be back and he would never patronize the store. Would you rather the guy not open up his shop? I’m pretty certain the rules for insurance are probably consistent at various ranges.

So, hats off to assholes like SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED for getting all GOA on a shop-owner over something he can’t control. Thank you for making this guy’s life hard. And thank you for ruining what was probably an otherwise fulfilling afternoon for the guy. I mean, it’s not like you can’t take your frustration out on the insurance folks be sending them a letter. It’s much better to attack a guy who happens to be on the same side of the gun issue as you. I mean, that makes sense, making life hard on people with like interests. I mean, Hell, if a gun range has rules about gun handling, it’s like the gun controllers have won!

Asshat.

Glenn Reynolds mentioned the Aptera. About three weeks ago, I saw on Pellissippi Parkway a three wheeled futuristic looking car. It was bright red. I thought it was odd and I was curious. I went home and some combination of googling three-wheeled vehicles lead me to believe it was an Aptera. The vehicle I saw sat two in the front. Anyway, turns out Aptera only has prototypes in Cali and all Aptera’s are white. So, obviously, what I saw was not an Aptera. Anyone know of a similar looking vehicle? Or, better yet, any of you seen a similar car around Knoxville/Blount County?

KAG asks if Elliot Spitzer was local:

Where would he have gone for his “needs?” Magnolia Avenue? One of the “spas” on Alcoa Highway? Do “high end” call girl services exist in the greater Knoxville metropolitan area?

Well, they shut down the spa on Alcoa highway. I always got a kick out of those when I traveled a lot for business. I’d get in from a late flight at the airport, start the drive home, look over and see that the spas were open. At 2:00 in the morning. And I’d laugh. Rumor was, authorities looked the other way even though they knew what was happening there. Then something happened and they got shut down.

Then, I recall in college, a friend of mine telling me that there was a brothel in The Fort. No idea if that was true or not.

But I don’t think either of those qualified as “high end”.

In The City, My The City:

William Roseburgh told a judge that “Yahweh” was his legal representation and refused any other counsel on Monday — but he has apparently sought attorneys’ assistance before on other criminal charges.

Ok. He’s charged with having an illegal nursery for plants. No, really, that’s a crime.

Well, all things Maryville.

The Mrs. has now had it happen on at least three separate occasions. She’s looking up something in the city (my the city) and the number one result is Les Jones. She thinks it’s funny. Small internet.

Look at the signs!

Seriously though, the dogs had a history of attacking people and it’s owners like that who give the owners of other politically incorrect dogs a bad name.

County workers accidentally burned down a woman’s home. However, the county will only reimburse her for $100K despite her property being assessed at $230K. She volunteered to let two county trucks dump brush on her property. They knocked over a power line that caused the fire. And this is beautiful:

Don Stallions, who heads the Risk Management Department for Blount County, said the Tennessee Governmental Tort Liability Act protects the government from being sued out of existence.

Well, after displaying such incompetence, is that necessarily a bad thing?

“The government used to be immune from law suits,” Stallions said. “People need to realize that the government isn’t like a business. When you sue a business, you get money that was generated as profit by an income-producing company. When you sue the government, it’s the people’s money you’re dealing with.

Really? There was a time when we couldn’t petition the government for a redress of grievances? You know, first amendment and all that?

“The Tort Liability Act allows counties in Tennessee to do business. Without it, our counties wouldn’t be able to function.”

Do your employees really screw up so much that that is an issue?

Stallions said Blount County has had numerous property damage claims in the past, but none that he can recall involving a claim on an entire home.

I guess so.

Via Ben.

A while back, I noted that The City (My The City) may get an indoor firing range. Well, it looks like Gunny’s is set to open in mid-March. Their website says this month but I called them and they said it looks like March (speaking of their website, yes it is horrible and when I stop by, I might offer to help them with that).

They have a 25 yard range and it looks like, if you join now, they’ll knock $80 of the price of membership. Rumor I’ve heard is that if you join, they’ll sell you your first handgun at cost. So, don’t hold them to that. It’s just what some locals have told me. There’s also the added bonus that they’re seven miles from my house.

Here in Blount County, there were some Tennessee Wildlife Resource Officers who happened to be near some bait for bears and, by all accounts, seemed to be hunting. But no charges will be filed because, despite being in the hunting area near the bait, they can’t seem to prove who placed the bait there.

Blount County Commissioner Mike Walker:

I know what property owners in my district are saying, in short “another government regulation that is not only placing more restrictions on property that I own, but also requiring financial expenditures by me and then taxing me for the improvements”

Ya think?

Cool, another blogging local politico.

The local paper has a bit on our spectacular views. We do have some. But they only show one picture. Dude, bandwidth is about as cheap as water. Of course, the bit isn’t totally about the views but about how the powers that be should govern with those views in mind.

Chris mourns the loss of darkness. In these parts, I have plenty. I recall moving from Knoxville to The City (my The City - which is not really so much a city) and thinking about how nice it was to see the stars.

In Blount county, there are allegations that the sheriff has threatened people who had the audacity to ask questions about 28 vehicles the sheriff department has misplaced. I’ve heard nothing about this in the local paper. I wonder if that’s how they paid for their new crime lab and SWAT vehicle?