I am posting this press release pretty much in its entirety because 1) it is so ridiculous; and 2) it is so downright scary. What is going on in Colorado and our country?

Discharging a BB gun in the city limits of Grand Junction, Colorado is illegal. In order to try to rid his area of an invasive species, the Eurasian Dove, which Colorado allows to be hunted with no bag limit, James Shults requested a Discharge Permit to use a 30-year old Daisy BB gun to run the pest from his residence and from neighbors’ areas with their permission.

After inspection of Shults’ neighborhood by two police sergeants the Chief (whom Shults likes personally) refused the permit because the neighborhood is “densely populated.” Shults, a former national and multi-state rifle champion and holder of many state and national records has no problem with the Chief’s decision, though he says “… it was sort of funny, of course it is densely populated, it’s inside the city.”

However, Shults noted that the Chief also sent copies of his denial letter to the Deputy Chief of Police, Grand Junction’s police patrol commanders and the city’s new high-tech 911 Center. Shults checked with his many law enforcement friends and contacts around the country and they confirmed he had indeed been targeted and flagged by the police and 911 center.

Shults says: “All this action for requesting a legal permit to discharge a Daisy BB gun in the city seems a little twisted. Am I now a terrorist to be watched by the full command of the Grand Junction police to include a flag on my residence by the 911 Center? I must be a very dangerous man armed with my Daisy BB gun; obviously a weapon of mass destruction.”

Shults has contacted the Grand Junction City Council and requested they modify this policy so that law-abiding citizens are not targeted and flagged like this in the future.

Again, what is going on in America?