echo3mike
Member
In todays Washington Post:
AND:
I didn't expect the whinny liberal media to let this go without a fight, (regardless of logic or concrete evidence). In fact, I fully expect to see the entire A section of the Post dedicated to the evil "assault weapon" sometime in our future.
S.
Weapons Alert: 9/14/04
Monday, July 19, 2004; Page A16
ANYONE SEEKING weapons of destruction inside the United States may find it considerably easier after Sept. 13. Unless Congress wakes up and votes to do something about it, the federal ban on the manufacture of certain military-style assault weapons will expire that day, and the mad marketing of these dangerous firearms will resume across the homeland. Though lawmakers in both parties, and President Bush on alternate days, have looked at the polls and supported renewal of the ban, the gun-lobby-controlled leadership on Capitol Hill won't lift a finger unless prompted by the president. Mr. Bush, in turn, is said to be waiting for Congress to send him legislation.
It's a deadly runaround. This is no anti-gun- owner law. Ten years ago, when the ban was enacted, Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.) explained his support for it: "I'm sensitive to the right of people to own a weapon. You have the right to defend yourself, especially in times when law and order seems to be very much under siege. But the proliferation of weapons whose only purpose is to kill a lot of people in a hurry seems to me not to be justified." Another prominent figure who lobbied for passage of the ban was former president Ronald Reagan.
Police officers whose lives are at risk on the streets have said time and again that assault weapons have no place in the mix of firearms for hunting or sport, that they pose a serious, unnecessary threat to law enforcement authorities. The gun lobby argues otherwise, claiming that semiautomatic assault weapons account for a small percentage of privately owned guns in America. So whose word should we take: the political mouthpieces of the National Rifle Association who promote the proliferation of anything with a trigger, or those who must deal with armed criminals, including snipers?
Opponents of the ban have still other absurd arguments for dropping the law. They say that the federal ban applies to only 19 weapons by name, and that copies are still out on the market; true, and all the more reason to improve the bill, not scrap it. As it stands, the federal law provides specific protection to 670 types of hunting rifles and shotguns currently being manufactured. Won't that do? Ah, but criminals will get assault weapons somewhere anyway, the gun peddlers say; sure, but is that a good reason to make it easier for them? What's so awful about life without assault weapons? Life with them is that much more vulnerable.
Mr. Bush need only give a forceful public cue to Congress to keep a ban in place. With the political conventions and elections this year, the days on Capitol Hill already are down to a precious few. Does the president care?
AND:
America Wants the Assault Weapons Ban
By Howard M. Metzenbaum
Monday, July 19, 2004; Page A17
A decade ago I was privileged to lead a fight with Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) on what for me has become a deeply personal issue: the federal ban on assault weapons. These killing machines had no place on our streets in 1994 and they have no place now. Yet as the days pass, it is becoming clear that many members of Congress are content to skip through the summer months doing nothing while awaiting this fall's greatest prize -- not the elections, but the sunset of the assault weapons ban.
Ten years after that great victory we are facing the extinction of an important public safety law that was an unusual piece of bipartisan lawmaking. In 1994 I had the support of two men whom I would rarely call my allies, Republican icons Ronald Reagan and Rudy Giuliani. As a result, Congress was able to put public safety ahead of special-interest politics.
What's going on these days, by contrast, is typical political doublespeak. The president speaks publicly in support of the assault weapons ban but refuses to lobby actively for it. The House majority leader, Tom DeLay of Texas, says the president never told him personally that he wants the assault weapons ban renewed, so DeLay isn't going to pass it.
There you have it. The president says he supports the assault weapons ban but refuses to lift a finger for it. And the powerful House majority leader -- who does not support the ban -- is pretending that all it would take to pass it is a word from the president.
This is a tragic development for many reasons, not the least of which is that the public wants this legislation. A new study, "Unconventional Wisdom," by the Consumer Federation of America and the Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence, found that a substantial majority of likely voters in 10 states support renewing and strengthening the federal assault weapons ban, as do most gun owners and National Rifle Association supporters. The survey found that:
• Voters in Midwestern states supported renewing the assault weapons ban slightly more than those in Southwestern states. Midwestern states (Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan and Missouri) averaged 72 percent support for renewal. Southwestern states (Arizona and New Mexico) averaged 67 percent. In Florida, 81 percent of likely voters support renewing the ban.
• Rural states, traditionally seen as very conservative on gun issues, strongly favored renewing the ban. Sixty-eight percent of voters in South Dakota and West Virginia support renewal.
• Majorities of gun owners in all but two states favored renewing the ban. Even in those two states, Missouri and Ohio, only slightly less than 50 percent of gun owners and NRA supporters favored renewing the ban.
• In nine of 10 states surveyed, union households supported renewing the ban by at least 60 percent. In Pennsylvania, 80 percent of union households supported renewing the ban and 73 percent supported strengthening it.
• At least 60 percent of current and former military members and military families supported renewing the ban in all states surveyed. In Wisconsin, more than three-fourths (77 percent) of current and former military members and military families support renewing the ban.
In March the Senate passed a renewed ban as an amendment to a gun industry immunity bill, which was the NRA's top legislative priority. President Bush issued a statement of administration policy calling the assault weapons ban amendment "unacceptable." The amendment passed on a bipartisan vote, 52 to 47, but the underlying bill was defeated. It was a stunning loss for the gun lobby. The NRA opposes even a straight renewal of the ban. It maintains that most Americans don't want the ban renewed, let alone strengthened, and that Congress should let the ban expire. Not true.
The gun industry is licking its chops waiting for the ban to expire. In an upcoming report from the Consumer Federation of America, "Back in Business," one assault weapon manufacturer's sales and marketing director told us, "When the AWB sunsets, which I fully expect it to do, we will be manufacturing pre-ban style weapons and shipping them to the general public through distribution systems and dealers the very next day without doubt . . . .We look forward to Sept. 14th with great enthusiasm."
After 19 years in the Senate, I understand differences of opinions, ideologies and constituencies. What I cannot understand is why congressional leaders and the administration think that the American public won't notice that the ban expired. We'll notice, and they'll be sorry.
The writer, a former Democratic senator from Ohio, is chairman of the Consumer Federation of America.
I didn't expect the whinny liberal media to let this go without a fight, (regardless of logic or concrete evidence). In fact, I fully expect to see the entire A section of the Post dedicated to the evil "assault weapon" sometime in our future.
S.
