It’s primary day in New Hampshire, the one time every four years where reporters in the D.C.-to-New York City corridor pretend to care about the people of a state that they otherwise regard as a quaint backwater.

The NY Times sent a reporter up to New Hampshire to spend the weekend with a species of creature that they simply can’t begin to understand, the 1/3-to-1/2 of Americans who own guns. It’s clear that the writer considers firearms to be a talisman that will somehow possess their owners, and force them into commit acts of unspeakable evil.

It’s an interesting read as a collectivist, clueless reporter attempts to gently educate the armed country bumpkins towards rightthink as he dabbles at shooting a 9-millimeter revolver and a fully automatic rifle with a drum magazine.

In the end, he’s clearly flummoxed at his inability to change minds.

The “bumpkins” had answers for every scripted talking point, and what’s more, they were personable, reasonable, intelligent and friendly… pretty much the opposite of the stereotype mocked in the newsroom every day over overpriced burnt coffee. When he pressed them about the real reasons for owning firearms as told by our Founding Fathers, the delicate New York City flower chalked up the constitutional imperative of defending against tyranny as “paranoia.”

He couldn’t, for the life of him, grasp the possibility that the tyranny that saw governments snuff out 262 million of their own citizens in the 20th century alone could happen here. Nor, could he understand an citizen-led insurgency as being a viable deterrent to tyranny, even those the armed citizenry outnumbers every branch of military and every member of law enforcement by 300-to-1 after those who honor their oaths refuse to fight for a corrupt government, or even join the insurgency as so many millions of combat veterans of our recent wars would.

Government is good. Too much liberty is bad. Downes “New York City values” are readily apparent.

No wonder he doesn’t “get” the rest of the country.

Note: Our sister site Townhall will be posting live primary updates from New Hampshire as precincts report in.