Then who would you vote for?
Well, again, I'm not happy with any of them on guns, but I'll get to your answer in a moment.
I think greyhound said it very well:
Remember that gun control is only one issue. Given, he is not as anti-gun as the other Democratic candidates, but on ALL other issues he is a typical far-leftist nanny-stater.
Dean is far to liberal for my tastes. Yes on
some issues he is a moderate (he is a fiscal conservative, which as a member of the Concord Coalition I like) but he is for gay marriage, for widespread abortion, in addition to being to anti-gun (look at the attitude behind the supposed "moderate" stance on guns- virtually unlimited gun ownership in VT or WY is ok, but there should be maybe a virtual ban in DC and LA
).
On guns no one is good.
Many of the Dems are more far out than Dean. Bush is for the AWB. Both parties have a bad history on guns (the ban on full-autos was under Reagan, the ban on imports of "assult weapons" was under Bush the first, for two examples).
But as greyhound said, there are other issues other than guns.
The only candidate likely to be decent on guns will be the Libertarian but being a conservative Democrat I'm sure there will be other important issues where I'm going to be even more displeased with him/her.
As a
conservative Democrat I'm unhappy with the Libertarians, and the Democrats on several issues: many seem to want unlimited abortions and want gay marriages. I'm unhappy with the Democrats on a few others: many would have our taxes too high, they don't like to cut
any existing program, they are against faith-based initiatives (often these are the most effective programs), they often want too many regulations on business, many tend to be bad on the military, they don't seem to want any restrictions on/reform of welfare, they are often notoriously bad on guns.
As a conservative
Democrat I'm not happy with the Libertarians and Republicans on many issues: they seem to want to gut even useful, needed and efficient gov't programs (like Social Security), they would drop taxes too far to levels that could not match a minimum of societal needs, they would favor too few regulations on businesses. I'm not happy with the Republicans alone on several issues as well: most seem to want to ban abortions altogether, they'd bring on many policies that would be bad for members of minority religions like me, they tend to have the wrong military priorities (big programs instead of more, better trained, people), they like to spend too much on their own pet projects, they seem to want to do away altogether with welfare.
So if you can find me a candidate who is for very few (or no) gun controls, is for keeping abortion legal, but heavily regulated, wants to preserve Social Security, is willing to keep some basic level of social welfare for the less fortunate (but insure through time limits and education that it can't be perminant), wishes to preserve family values and the family unit as it should be, will maintain spending and taxes at levels that will address basic societal needs but without going overboard (BALANCED BUDGET, probably my #1 issue, along with family values), will support faith-based initiatives but will not let religion encroach upon government, he/she must be pro-business while still being for a minimum of needed regulations (product safety, some minimum of environmental concerns, anti-trust), etc. I'm all ears. Until then, we pick and choose who comes closest to our views on a variety of issues and then we have to decide overall, which are most important and who is the least bad compromise. Many people are like me who have core issues that none of the candidates fit. All of them are bad on at least one of my core issues. So who is best, or least bad, on the largest number of them?
I will probably be voting for Lieberman in the primaries. He does not have a great record on guns, but it isn't any worse than Bush's and he is better on other issues than, say, Dean. He has finally come back to his conservative Democrat roots, informed by his religious, Torah true, values. He came out strongly against the Supreme Court's decision on sodomy. He's come out against Dean's VT law on gay marriage. He has supported several restrictions on abortion (while supporting keeping it available). He is a hawk on military issues (and very good on personnel and military quality of life issues). He is one of the only Democrats in either the House or Senate who supported Bush's faith-based initiatives.
Anyway, I don't come here to get into these kinds of discussions generally. I occasionally post on them, but I prefer to stick with gun issues, so I probably won't elaborate anymore, or debate anyone here. I'm on a gun board to discuss guns, not abortion, welfare, taxes, etc.