Senate gun control hearing today
Wed Jan 30 12:07:22 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Wed Jan 30 08:34:00 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Wed Jan 30 04:15:19 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Within days of opening its 51st Legislature, Arizona state lawmakers have begun considering HB 2291--a bill which declares any federal attempt to "ban or restrict ownership of a semi-automatic firearm... unenforceable" in the state.Good for them. If you're an Arizonian, call your legislators and support this bill.Moreover, the bill also lists as "unenforceable" any federal ban on magazines for such weapons and categorizes any requirement for firearm registration as a non-starter as well.
Wed Jan 30 03:30:49 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
People are not buying them in record numbers just to turn them in.A majority of poll respondents -- 52 percent -- revealed that someone in their home owns a gun. Those respondents were then asked, "If the government passed a law to take your guns, would you give up your guns or defy the law and keep your guns?"
Approximately 65 percent indicated they would "defy the law," including 70 percent of Republicans and 52 percent of Democrats who answered the question. Only 22 percent said they would "give up" their guns, while 13 percent were not sure.
Wed Jan 30 03:18:29 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
The five Democratic senators from traditionally pro-gun states who have expressed skepticism about the bill are Max Baucus and Jon Tester of Montana, Mark Begich of Alaska, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Joe Manchin of West Virginia. Independent Senator Angus King of Maine, who caucuses with Democrats, also said he opposes a ban. Maine Senator Susan Collins, a Republican who supported similar legislation in 2004, has indicated she is unlikely to back the proposed ban in its current form.When you write your Senators to instruct them to oppose the semi-auto ban, you should also instruct them to oppose the magazine ban and universal background check legislation. No compromise on gun control.
When you are contacting your senators and representatives, tell them you oppose:The American gun owning public is being duped again, just like we were duped the two weeks before the election when we were convinced that Romney was ahead by several percentage points. The media, including our "friends" at Fox, Drudge, and other "conservative" outlets, are attempting to sell us the concept that the "assault weapon ban" legislation can't pass, and this is a lie. We are told that Bill Clinton sternly warned his party that they will be punished in the mid-terms, and that the NRA is "too powerful" for any real legislation to make it through congress. This is also a lie. Behind our backs, the political machine is crafting public opinion in what have become the majority voting blocks to convince national and state legislators that they are safe for the next election -- and they are safe. American gun owners didn't show up in force for the last election, and we are not feared as a voting block any longer. Don't be a fool and believe it when they tell us we can't lose. We are going to get beaten again if we don't act. And this time it isn't a slippery slope. This time they are going to outlaw an entire class of guns with no loopholes.
You must call and write your legislators today. Let them know that you know who they are. You know their name, and you will remember how they voted come election day. Don't just use the web form, and don't just call their Washington, DC numbers. Call their local numbers and tell their staffers that you and ever gun owner you know will be watching them, and funding their opponents if they vote for this ineffective and stupid legislation. At some point you have to take action, and you have to go that extra step, and now is the time.
Remember, we have to stop everything they bring to the table. Stopping the semiauto ban in return for a magazine ban or an effective gun registry is not a win. A draw is stopping them cold and destroying their power for another 8 years or more, like we did after the battle in 2004. A win is taking ground back.
Wed Jan 30 02:59:12 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Note that there were two attackers here.While Democrats attempt to ban "military-style assault weapons" like the AR-15, a Rochester Institute of Technology student used that very gun to thwart home invaders and save his roommate's life.
Christopher Boise heard noises in the basement of his apartment; when he went to investigate, he found two intruders. One of the men trained a gun on him. Boise screamed, which woke his roommate, Raymond, who grabbed his gun bag and took out his AR-15.
A 15-year old boy used his father's AR-15 to defend himself and his 12-year old sister against two burglars at their home just north of Houston, Texas.Again, two attackers.
When confronted by three intruders in his home, Al Michaud invoked Colorado's Make My Day Law and opened fire.Three attackers this time.
Wed Jan 30 02:46:40 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Law Enforcement
International Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators
International Association of Chiefs of Police
Major Cities Chiefs Association
Police Executive Research Forum
Police Foundation
Women in Federal Law Enforcement
Chaska (Minn.) Police Chief Scott Knight, former chairman of the Firearms Committee, International Association of Chiefs of Police
Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca
Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck
San Diego Police Chief Bill Lansdowne
Localities
U.S. Conference of Mayors
Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors
Ventura County Board of Supervisors
Oakland Unified School District Superintendent Anthony Smith
Boston City Council
California mayors
Chula Vista Mayor Cheryl Cox
Long Beach Mayor Bob Foster
Los Angeles Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa
Oakland Mayor Jean Quan
Petaluma Mayor David Glass
Pleasant Hill Mayor Michael Harris
Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson
San Diego Mayor Bob Filner
San Francisco Mayor Edwin M. Lee
San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed
Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido
Santa Cruz Mayor Hilary Bryant
Saratoga Mayor Jill Hunter
Tiburon Mayor Emmett O?Donnell
California cities
Calabasas, Calif.
Lemon Grove, Calif.
Los Angeles
Stockton, Calif.
Ventura, Calif.
West Hollywood, Calif.
Gun safety (sic)
Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence
Coalition to Stop Gun Violence
Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence
Mayors Against Illegal Guns
Violence Policy Center
Washington CeaseFire
Education and child welfare
20 Children
American Academy of Pediatrics
American Federation of Teachers
Boys & Girls Clubs of America
Child Welfare League of America
Children?s Defense Fund
Every Child Matters
Moms Rising
National Association of Social Workers
National PTA
National Education Association
San Diego Unified School District
Religious
African Methodist Episcopal Church
Alliance of Baptists
American Baptist Churches of the South
American Baptist Home Mission Societies
American Friends Service Committee
Baptist Peace Fellowship of North America
Camp Brotherhood
Catholic Charities USA
Catholic Health Association
Catholic Health Initiatives
Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good
Catholics United
Church of the Brethren
Church Women United, Inc.
Conference of Major Superiors of Men
Disciples Home Missions, Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
Dominican Sisters of Peace
FaithsAgainstGunViolence.org
Franciscan Action Network
Friends Committee on National Legislation
Health Ministries Association
Heeding God?s Call
Hindu American Foundation
Interfaith Alliance of Idaho
Islamic Society of North America
Jewish Council for Public Affairs
Jewish Reconstructionist Movement
Leadership Conference of Women Religious
Mennonite Central Committee, Washington Office
National Advocacy Center of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd
National Council of Churches
National Episcopal Health Ministries
NETWORK, A National Catholic Social Justice Lobby
Pax Christi USA
PICO Network Lifelines to Healing
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Office of Public Witness
Progressive National Baptist Convention
Rabbinical Assembly
Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism
San Francisco Interfaith Council
Sikh Council on Religion and Education, USA
Sisters of Mercy of the Americas
Sojourners
Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations
United Church of Christ
United Methodist Church
United Methodist Women
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development
United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism
Washington National Cathedral
Women of Reform Judaism
Health care
American Academy of Pediatrics
American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists
American College of Surgeons
American Public Health Association
Doctors for America
National Association of School Nurses
Other
Alliance for Business Leadership
American Bar Association
Black American Political Association of California
Grandmothers for Peace International
National Parks Conservation Association
Sierra Club
TASH
Washington Office on Latin America
Wed Jan 30 02:10:25 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Wed Jan 30 02:09:45 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
"If he is a skeet shooter, why have we not heard of this? Why have we not seen photos? Why hasn't he referenced this at any point in time?" Blackburn said Monday on CNN's "Erin Burnett OutFront." "I tell you what I do think," she later added. "I think he should invite me to Camp David, and I'll go skeet shooting with him and I bet I'll beat him."Because he isn't a skeet shooter, and never has been. That's why it never came up before, and it's why there are no pictures of Obama shooting skeet. Or anything else. Obama's claim to be a regular skeet shooter is nothing more than his version of the classic anti-gun platitude, "I'm a gun owner, but..." or "I'm an NRA member, but..." that you see all the time in articles calling for more gun control. Generally speaking, it's a blatant lie, nothing more than a rhetorical tactic to persuade the reader by asserting similarity.
Wed Jan 30 02:09:16 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Tue Jan 29 05:07:43 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
That's San Diego chief of police William Lansdowne. Thank you, Mr Lansdowne, for making your agenda clear.Lansdowne has gone on record saying: "I could not be more supportive of the president for taking the position he has. I think it's courageous with the politics involved in this process. [And] I think it's going to eventually make the country safer."
He also has personally advocated for a legislative solution that would allow current lawful firearms owners to keep their assault weapons if new sales are banned, but prohibit assault firearms from be passed down to living relatives after death, meaning the weapon would be destroyed when the current owner dies.
He made it clear that it may take "a generation," but new laws could eventually take all guns off the streets.
"We're seeing an increase in the quality of weapons, in the types of weapons we're seeing... even though we have a ban here in California."He admits the ban doesn't work, but wants to impose it nationally.
"The officers in many cases face people better armed than they are."Better armed than the police? Really?
San Diego Police DepartmentThe Beretta 92FS can accept up to 32 round magazines. The Ruger PC9 carbine can accept a 15 round magazine. The Ruger Mini-14 can accept up to 30 round magazines and has a select-fire version. The Colt AR-15 semiautomatic rifle can accept up to 100 round magazines and is a semi-automatic version of a fully-automatic firearm. The Cadillac Gage peacekeeper is an armored vehicle that can mount a full size machine gun or a 40mm grenade launcher.
Issues the 9×19mm Beretta Mod 92FS pistol, 9×19mm Ruger PC9 semiautomatic carbine, 5.56×45mm Colt AR-15 semiautomatic rifle, and 5.56×45mm Ruger Mini-14 semiautomatic rifle.
Uses the Cadillac Gage Peacekeeper 4×4 armoured car.
Tue Jan 29 04:53:17 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Florida U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson has called for any new gun control laws to include a ban on assault weapons, and he has at least one supporter from the local law enforcement community. Nelson said as an avid hunter, he owns several guns, himself, but would support a ban on assault weapons. He also said he wants to see universal background checks and a ban on high-capacity magazine clips. He said magazine clips found in the hands of criminals in Orange County were more than double what deputies carry.He wants the full trifecta: assault weapons ban, universal background checks, and a magazine ban. He uses the "police are outgunned on the streets" lie and, of course, claims to be a gun owner himself.
Tue Jan 29 03:09:10 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Punishing kids for finger guns has nothing to do with school safety; they know the difference between a finger and a gun as well as adults do. It has everything to do with "moral disarmament."I'm not sure about the deliberate part. If I was reaching for an explanation, I would look more to the gender gap in the teaching profession -- teachers are predominantly women -- combined with almost two decades of horror about school shootings. It's easy for someone who spends their days working with children to indulge in magical thinking and try to prevent a school shooting by banning the symbol of shooting and hoping that has an influence on the young minds in her care.
Tue Jan 29 02:57:59 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Tue Jan 29 02:28:03 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Tue Jan 29 02:16:06 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Tue Jan 29 01:54:57 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Tue Jan 29 01:50:55 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Manchin, a moderate Democrat with an "A" rating from the National Rifle Association, has also recruited his close friend, Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), to help with the background check legislation. Kirk, who is much more moderate than Coburn and hails from a state suffering from urban gun violence, also plans to unveil legislation next week with Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) to make illegal gun trafficking a federal crime.I don't think you'll keep that "A" rating much longer, Senator.
Mon Jan 28 04:51:30 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Illegal gun trafficking is already a federal crime.
Manchin, a moderate Democrat with an "A" rating from the National Rifle Association, has also recruited his close friend, Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), to help with the background check legislation. Kirk, who is much more moderate than Coburn and hails from a state suffering from urban gun violence, also plans to unveil legislation next week with Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) to make illegal gun trafficking a federal crime.
Mon Jan 28 04:47:10 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
It sounds like Coburn needs to hear from his constituents.Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) is working with Democratic senators on a bill that would mandate background checks for all gun buyers, with some limited exceptions.
In an interview Friday with a Tulsa television station, Coburn said he is working with Sens. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Joe Manchin III (D-W. Va.) on plans to keep weapons away from criminals and the mentally ill.
Coburn's office didn't immediately respond to requests for comment, but other Senate aides familiar with the negotiations confirmed his involvement. If a deal involving Coburn pans out, his ruby-red Republican reputation would lend significantly to any bipartisan effort to draft gun-control legislation.
"I think there's lots of good things that can happen in terms of mental health screening and checks," Coburn told KRMG-TV Friday. "If you transfer your car, you have to have a license to transfer, it has to go through that. That's a responsibility of freedom. I have no problems with us making sure that we don't allow guns to get in the hands of either felons, or people who are a danger to themselves or other people. I'm willing to work with Manchin and Schumer on that, and going to."
Hat tip and more info available from a Keyboard and a .45.
Mon Jan 28 04:44:52 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Mon Jan 28 04:14:29 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Why indeed?After every tragedy, legislation gets rushed through that's typically just a bunch of stuff that various folks had long wanted all along, but couldn't pass before. Then it's hustled through as a "solution" to the tragedy, even though close inspection usually reveals that the changes wouldn't have prevented the tragedy, and don't even have much to do with it.
The goal, thus, is to prevent close inspection through a combination of heavy-handed legislative techniques and bullying rhetoric: If you don't want to pass our bill without reading it, you must hate the children.
Over the years, we've gotten a lot of lousy legislation this way -- the Patriot Act, for example, about which I wrote a column something like this one back in 2001. We've gotten it because politicians like to manipulate voters and avoid scrutiny.
But why let them?
Mon Jan 28 04:10:48 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
Even if you accept Feinstein's false premise that there is something especially assaulty or murdery about the guns she wants to ban, her bill would not actually get rid of them, since millions of existing "assault weapons" would remain in circulation. Feinstein says her aim is to "dry up the supply of these weapons over time." But guns are durable products that remain usable for decades, not a puddle that evaporates when the sun comes up. Feinstein claims her bill will "help end the mass shootings that have devastated countless families and terrorized communities." How exactly will it do that?Senator Ted Cruz knows his stuff. This response is pretty much exactly what I would tell him to say:
PowerLine's John Hinderaker:"Washington politicians shouldn't be taking advantage of recent tragedy to try to push an aggressive gun control agenda. Real assault weapons -- machine guns -- are already functionally illegal, and they have been since 1934. This proposal would have done nothing to prevent the terrible murders in Newtown, but it would limit the constitutional liberties of law-abiding citizens. And gun control doesn't work -- the empirical data overwhelmingly demonstrate that strict gun-control laws consistently produce more crime and more murders.
The Second Amendment exists to ensure that law-abiding Americans can protect their homes and families, and I look forward to helping lead the fight to defeat this bill and to protect our constitutional right to keep and bear arms."
Congress has passed a lot of dumb laws, but it isn't going to pass this one. I doubt that it can get through the Senate, let alone the House. Perhaps some modifications to the background check system can pass. So what's the point? Gun control is part of the Democrats' permanent campaign. They see a political advantage in pushing for draconian legislation, not because it has any chance to pass, or would do any good if it did, but because it fires up the party's base in anticipation of the 2014 election. Hence the showmanship and even religious fervor that accompanied Feinstein's announcement of her legislation.The National Rifle Association:
Senator Feinstein has been trying to ban guns from law-abiding citizens for decades. It's disappointing but not surprising that she is once again focused on curtailing the Constitution instead of prosecuting criminals or fixing our broken mental health system. The American people know gun bans do not work and we are confident Congress will reject Senator Feinstein's wrong-headed approach.I hope they're right.
As a former Texas Supreme Court Justice and Attorney General, I have firsthand knowledge of crime-fighting policies that work, and I believe that citizens' Second Amendment rights should not be restricted because of the actions of criminals. Rather, we must focus our attention on the source of violent crime: criminals who use firearms to commit crimes. I believe that strictly enforcing the law?and meting out tougher sentences for career criminals and those who use firearms when committing crimes?will reduce crime more effectively than gun or equipment bans, which primarily serve to take firearms away from law-abiding citizens.It shouldn't take multiple constituent emails to drag a pro-2nd Amendment position out of a Senator from Texas, for crying out loud.
I appreciate the opportunity to represent Texans in the United States Senate, and you may be certain that I will continue working with my colleagues to protect our Second Amendment rights. Thank you for taking the time to contact me.
Mon Jan 28 03:54:17 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]
It's almost comical how desperate they are to link gunwalking to Bush and protect Obama from Fast and Furious.During Senate hearings in 2011, Breuer conceded that he had failed to alert other Justice Department officials that federal agents had allowed guns to illegally flow into Mexico and onto U.S. streets between 2006 and 2007. The practice, known as "gun walking," was also a key part of the Obama administration's Phoenix gun-tracking operation, "Fast and Furious."
The operation came under fire when many of the weapons later turned up at crime scenes in Mexico and the United States, including two where a Border Patrol agent was killed.
Mon Jan 28 03:43:58 CST 2013 by TriggerFinger. Comments [Tweet]