USA: "Kerry Takes Aim at Dean Positions on Guns"

[cuchulainn]

fromt the A.P. via Newsday

http://www.newsday.com/news/politic...,7369250.story?coll=sns-ap-politics-headlines

Kerry Takes Aim at Dean Positions on Guns

By WILL LESTER
Associated Press Writer

October 31, 2003, 12:06 PM EST

WASHINGTON -- John Kerry accused presidential rival Howard Dean Friday of taking positions on gun safety that put the interests of the National Rifle Association ahead of the safety of children and families.

Kerry, a Massachusetts senator, criticized Dean's 1992 statement to the National Rifle Association that he opposed any restriction on private ownership of assault weapons.

"Howard Dean's opposition to sensible gun safety measures ... is indefensible," Kerry said in a statement. "It explains why he has been endorsed by the NRA eight times. I believe we must put the safety of our children and families ahead of special interests like the NRA."

Kerry said he would "never pander to the extremist NRA for personal or political expediency. I will beat the NRA."

Dean said Friday in Durham, N.H.: "I don't respond to that silly kind of Washington talk."

"I come from a rural state with a very low homicide rate," Dean told reporters. "We had five homicides one year. It's a state where hunting is a part of our life. I understand that's not the traditional Democratic position."

Dean said "when you're running for governor, they ask you what you would do in your state."

Dean aides told The New York Times for a Friday story that the opposition to restrictions on assault weapons that he expressed on the signed 1992 NRA questionnaire applied only to a state ban, defined broadly enough to also apply to shotguns commonly used by hunters in Vermont.

Dean assures voters on the campaign trail this year that he supports the federal assaults weapons ban enacted under President Bill Clinton in 1994.

While many Democratic primary voters support federal restrictions on gun ownership, there is less support for those restrictions among swing voters and Democrats in conservative states. Democratic nominee Al Gore lost several states in 2000 where gun control is not popular.

Centrist Democrats have warned that the party's candidates need to adopt a stance that recognizes the rights of gun owners, while pushing for gun safety laws. They warn that candidates who are aggressive in challenging gun owners without also defending their right to own a gun will be at a substantial disadvantage in rural and conservative states.
Copyright © 2003, The Associated Press

 

[sm]

Related

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/31/p...200&en=bf47a83479534761&ei=5062&partner=GOOGL
<snip>

Howard Dean is just one Democratic presidential candidate who has had to calibrate his stand on gun control. While the party's primary voters strongly favor it, voters in the general election are more mixed.
<snip>

Dean Walks a Tightrope Over Positions on Gun Control
By ADAM NAGOURNEY and JODI WILGOREN

Published: October 31, 2003


ASHUA, N.H., Oct. 30 — Back when Howard Dean was running for governor of Vermont in 1992, he told the National Rifle Association in a signed questionnaire that he opposed any restrictions on private ownership of assault weapons.

These days, running for the Democratic presidential nomination and appealing to a very different electorate from that of his small, largely rural state, Dr. Dean assures audiences that he firmly supports the assault weapons ban enacted under President Bill Clinton in 1994 though vigorously opposing any further federal regulation of guns.


Dr. Dean declined a request for an interview on Thursday. But a spokeswoman said there was no contradiction between his current position and what he told the N.R.A. in its 1992 questionnaire, a copy of which was provided to The New York Times by aides to a rival Democratic candidate who is a stronger advocate of gun control.

The spokeswoman, Tricia Enright, said Dr. Dean's answers 11 years ago applied only to a state ban, though in fact the question at issue specifically referred to both federal and state law. Ms. Enright also pointed out that the question defined assault weapons in a way that encompassed semiautomatic rifles and shotguns commonly used by hunters in Vermont, while the federal ban applied to 19 specific weapons typically used in street violence.

But Andrew Arulanandam, a spokesman for the N.R.A., said the guns banned by the 1994 law "weren't that much different from firearms that are used in hunting and competition." Mr. Arulanandam accused Dr. Dean of "schizophrenia," saying he had taken positions friendly to the rifle association as governor but had changed since becoming a candidate for president.

This turn of events captures the difficulty that gun control poses for Dr. Dean and the other Democratic contenders as they struggle with an issue that many say helped cost their party the White House and a handful of Congressional seats in 2000.

Polls show overwhelming support among Democratic primary voters for federal regulation of gun ownership. But that is not the case among general-election voters as a whole. Dr. Dean himself has said that Al Gore would be president today were it not for support of gun control. Like many other Democrats, he is mindful of Mr. Gore's losses in the 2000 election in states where gun control is not popular, like Tennessee, Florida, Arkansas and West Virginia.

In one example of the issue's delicate nature, another Democratic candidate, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, having declared his support on Sunday for reauthorization of the assault weapons ban, will be in Iowa on Friday for what his campaign hopes will be a well-photographed pheasant hunt. And in a forum at the University of New Hampshire on Wednesday, yet another contender, Gen. Wesley K. Clark, made a point of talking in great detail about his childhood in a home where his father kept guns.

But of all the candidates, Democrats say, Dr. Dean may have the trickiest road to walk: trying, after establishing himself in Vermont as highly skeptical of gun control, to appeal to a decidedly liberal Democratic electorate.

At stop after stop, Dr. Dean says that gun control is an issue that should be left to the states but that he supports the central federal gun-control measures adopted during the Clinton administration: the 1994 assault weapons ban and the Brady Bill, which mandated a waiting period on the purchase of handguns.

At a debate before the Children's Defense Fund in Washington last spring, Dr. Dean said: "I support the assault weapons ban, I support reauthorization of the assault weapons ban." He tells audiences here and in Iowa that he supports the ban "because I never met a hunter who needed an AK-47 to shoot a deer."

But he appears to have taken another position in 1992, when he was seeking the N.R.A.'s support of his run for governor. On question after question posed by the rifle association, he voiced opposition to various gun control measures, including state legislation to impose a waiting period for buying handguns.

 

[Andrew Rothman]

Centrist Democrats have warned that the party's candidates need to adopt a stance that recognizes the rights of gun owners, while pushing for gun safety laws.

Centrist Democrats have warned that the party's candidates need to shake gun owners' hands while kicking them in the nuts.

 

[Mark Tyson]

.

Centrist Democrats have warned that the party's candidates need to shake gun owners' hands while kicking them in the nuts.

Some centrist Democrats have been working pretty damn hard to change the party's stance on the issue at the local and national level.

As for the article, it reveals once again that those who would deny us our civil rights are working hard to split us between the hunters/bird shooters. We need to reach out to these guys and tell them not to be taken in - they'll come for your engraved pheasant shotgun right after they've taken our handguns.

 

[foghornl]

Sayeth the Pot "Hey, Kettle, you're kinda scorched" . . . .

 

[Cosmoline]

He's frankly no worse than Bush Sr., and since Bush Jr. will probably revive the stupid ban anyway it's a moot issue. Dr. Dean's stand is far from ideal, but I don't trust the GOP on this, either. At least Dean is trying to remove gun control as a federal issue--and frankly he's already done more to help this cause along than Bush Jr. has in all his years in the White House.

 

[Langenator]

Wow, somebody besides Kucinich found an issue that they can actually hit Comrade Dean from the left on. Of course, anything that pushes Dean further left just makes him more likely to lose in the general election.

Interesting thought, but I wonder for what segment of the Democrat nominating electorate is gun control a make or break issue? Although I'm sure someone in the Dean campaign has already figured out exactly how many votes his position is gaining and costing.

 

[ReadyontheRight]

That's kind of like Michael Moore telling Rosie O'Donnell she's too fat.

 

[Sean Smith]

We had five homicides one year.

So much for correlating firearm restrictions with violent crime. Democrat logic: strict national gun control must be put into place to prevent the non-crime noted above.

 

[toro]

The only thing I can say about Dr. Dean is that he really looks like my dog. He has the same smile. My dog can smile. Although I don't know if I want Dean for president. He is way too far left IMHO.

By the way, I just now saw a picture of Kerry with a gun as if he were hunting. I thought he didn't like guns. Mmmmm, now I am getting confused. You know I'll bet he is just kidding about hunting. Remember how the press hounded Bush number 1 about hunting? He gave up and started fishing.

Mrs. Toro


____________________________________
1 Peter 4: 13,14
But rejoice in as much as ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings: that when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy. If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye: for the spirit of glory and of God restest upon you; on their part he is evil spoken of, but on your part he is glorified.

 

[makarov1]

In another dumb statement, Kerry professed the right to hunt and that we should protect the rights of sportsmen. How ironic that the statement was made in a barn, since Kerry was acting like he was born in a barn and can't read the Constitution. I think I've written this several times this month, but THE 2ND AMMENDMENT DOES NOT, IN ANY WAY, PROTECT THE RIGHT TO HUNT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Standing in a barn in humble surroundings shouldn't mean you can't read and understand the Constitution. I sincerely hope that duck hunters can read and understand the Bill of Rights. Democrats just amaze me more every day.

 

[Standing Wolf]

I'd sooner vote for a communist than a representative of the Democratic (sic) party: at least the communist is honest enough to admit what he is.