AL.com:

Pistol permits are a financial boon to the Madison County sheriff’s department but that’s not why Sheriff Blake Dorning opposes a Senate bill that would eliminate them.

“We hear it’s just a money thing,” Dorning said Wednesday.

I wonder where he’s hearing that?

“No, it’s not. It’s a life and death safety issue for our men and women because the equipment we’re able to provide them with drastically makes them more efficient and more able to address the situations that they come into every day.”

Dorning and other top department officials held a press conference Wednesday to follow up on the open letter the sheriff posted online over the weekend.

Capt. Michael Salomonsky outlined a handful of cases where law enforcement tracked down criminals through their pistol permits as evidence for the need to oppose the bill introduced by Sen. Gerald Allen, R-Tuscaloosa.

The bill would repeal the requirement to have a permit to conceal carry a pistol. It would also allow conceal carry at events such as demonstrations and protest rallies. Without the criminal background checks required for a permit, applicants with a violent criminal past would be able to conceal carry, Dorning said.

Officials also met head-on the issue of money associated with the permit fees, saying that the permits yield about $700,000 annually to the department.

[ … ]

“Without technology, you’re almost going back 20 years to a deputy who just has the basics,” Jernigan said. “I really feel this community wants a professionally trained and a professionally equipped law enforcement agency to go out and protect the public.”

Jernigan said pistol permit fees are not an infringement on the Second Amendment, which provides for the right to bear arms. Jernigan it’s no different than paying a fee for a drivers license, marriage license, hunting license or car registration.

Thanks for self-identifying as a liar.  Driving a car is not mentioned in the constitution.  And if you really feel that the community wants the things you say you think you need, then why not make that case straight to the community and let them decide whether they want to fund them or not?

Oh, it’s because you have people who want to defend their lives over a barrel.  This is a forced tax of a targeted set of people for exercising what God and the founders consider an inalienable right.  You know it’s true.

In telling me it’s not all about the money, and then spending so much effort try to tell us what you need the money for, you’ve told us it’s all about the money.  So we’re back where we started, and you have no case.