Posted on 04/30/2006 10:06:16 AM PDT by neverdem
After Port Arthur, Australia set off a universal gun-control revolution
TODAY we remember the Port Arthur murder victims in church services and vigils, prayers and concerts, books and documentaries. The cross listing their names overlooks the memorial garden, a quiet place for contemplation and tears in honour of those so brutally slain on April 28, 1996.
Another memorial to those killed and wounded on that awful day is less visible or tangible but powerful nonetheless: Australia's nationally uniform gun laws. Out of horror and insanity, something positive and rational was forged.
Ten years later it is hard to believe the indifference to public safety embodied in the old gun laws. In those days civilians could buy military weapons and there was no limit on the number of guns an individual could stockpile. NSW, Queensland and Tasmania had no registration for rifles and shotguns, so it was impossible for the police to know if someone had a gun (or 10).
A judge in a domestic violence case might order that firearms be seized, but in the absence of registration the perpetrator could claim not to have any guns and the matter would end there. In other states and territories the laws were stricter, but could be evaded simply by travelling to one of the three permissive states to shop for weapons.
Throwing out this rickety framework was a pioneering step for Australia alongside Canada, which was also overhauling its law in the wake of a massacre by an alienated and angry young man with easy access to military assault rifles. Both countries have experienced a drop in gun violence as a result.
In Australia and Canada, policy-makers involved in the reforms said they were reading "the mood of the nation". During the past decade this same mood has spread throughout the international community, with significant gun law reforms passed or proposed in dozens of parliaments.
Gun law reform now is similar to domestic violence reform in the 1980s, when country after country realised their policies were antiquated and indefensible. South Africa, Britain, Nicaragua, Montenegro, Germany, Cambodia, Mauritius and Brazil have recently toughened their gun laws. In Belgium, Paraguay, Liberia, Guatemala, Burundi, Portugal, Senegal, Macedonia and Argentina (among others) the reforms are under way.
Particularly striking is the case of Brazil, which has one of the highest rates of gun violence, with nearly 40,000 gun deaths in 2003. That year the gun law was tightened, with spectacular results. Gun deaths dropped for the first time after 13 years of rising continuously; by the end of 2004 the rate had fallen by 8per cent, which translated into more than 3200 lives saved.
The gun control revolution has also reached the UN, where a process to reduce the proliferation and misuse of small arms kicked off in 2001. The UN process is developing global norms to regulate the world's estimated 650 million guns and has produced an international agreement on the marking and tracing of weapons. We expect further progress from the five-year review conference to be held this June in New York.
These UN conferences are attended by government officials, non-governmental organisations supporting tougher firearm regulation and the National Rifle Association of America.
One of the most powerful lobby groups on Capitol Hill in Washington, the NRA appears to be no less influential on the US delegation at the UN. Even very modest declarations on small arms are opposed by the US. For example, a resolution expressing concern about the effect of weapons proliferation on humanitarian activities and development was passed with 177 votes in favour and one (the US) against.
The NRA has characterised this small arms process as a mission "to confiscate civilian firearms worldwide and impose on Americans the lesser, inferior, global standard of freedom". The UN and my own organisation, the International Action Network on Small Arms, are known as "the enemies of freedom".
According to NRA board member (and former congressman) Bob Barr: "That's really their ultimate agenda: to bring the United States down from the pinnacle of freedom to simply being another one of these socialist states." This last is a reference to Britain, Australia and Canada, countries dubbed by the NRA as "formerly free nations".
Such ranting by American gun loons may seem to be a long way removed from Australia, unless you remember our own Gympie-based version screaming on television in May 1996: "The only currency that you can purchase freedom back with is blood!"
Then and now, whether in Queensland, Tasmania, Texas or elsewhere, we have paranoid, hate-filled people living in our societies. All the more reason to have strong controls on guns.
Rebecca Peters is the director of the International Action Network on Small Arms. She led Australia's National Coalition for Gun Control from 1992 to 1997.
Gun grabbing coming here. Join the NRA.
Precisely. More on our sworn enemy *here*.
Born in 1962, Peters grew up as a teenager in Costa Rica, the second of six children in an American family. As her father worked for the American Government there, 'half jokingly,' she suggested in an interview in Australia he "probably worked for the CIA." At age 15 years while attending an "alternative school" in Costa Rica, Peters was educated by itinerant "young hippies". It was during this new-age education she became "obsessed with changing the world."More here:
In Sydney, Peters enrolled in a university in the faculty of Engineering (possibly Macquarie), being just one of only two females in the course, but in 1983 she dropped out. For a time Rebecca took a job as a researcher and reporter with ABC Radio (known locally as the "Gay-BC"), worked with Andrew Olle, but soon found the nature of journalism, 'too disposable'.
In 1991 with a not-so-subtle agenda, Peters returned to university, enrolled as a law student gaining her law degree, at the end of which, she produced a thesis on 'tighter gun control'. This was the "centrepiece" of an enormous folio of material she collected and wrote for her campaign to remove loop-holes in existing gun laws in Australia. She promoted herself as a 'multilingual middle-class lawyer' who was fanatical about "gun control".
You may wish to drop a line to the Doctor so here is her working address: The Center on Crime, Community and Culture, 400 West 59th Street, New York, NY10019. Or perhaps you may wish to forward a congratulatory e-mail to < rpeters@sorosny.org .
Rebecca's doctorate included a stipend incidentally of US$32,500 p. a., plus various expenses covered in her 'budgeted' expenses, the lot bankrolled by the tax-exempt Soros Foundation.
Another lawyer, no wonder she's worse than useless.
Unless you actually oppose firearms confiscation and licensing, in which case alliance with a group that's repeatedly supported gun control efforts from the Gun Control Act of 1968 to the Brady Bill might not be your cup of tea.
1968: General Franklin Orth, Executive Vice President of NRA, testifies before Congress in favor of the Gun Control Act (GCA'68) that "[The NRA does] not think that any sane American, who calls himself an American, can object to placing into this bill the instrument which killed the president of the United States," /2/ (a ban on the mail-order sale of firearms). His statement of NRA support generates heated opposition from the (presumably insane) portion of the NRA membership, creating split between "sportsmen" and "hardliners."In which case, reconsider supporting those who bargain with your enemies, and study the alternatives.
Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership *here*,
Second Amendment Foundation *here*,
National Firearms Act Trade and Collectors Association *here*
Note, however, that we do have more than a few pretty good ones on our side.
It seems largely to be a matter of examining their backgrounds and the motives for their association with the causes they support. I've seen very few of those who support the Second Amendment getting rich at it; quite the opposite: they're often funding Second Amendment Civil Rights activities out of their own pockets.
Orth died in 1970 and your "Facts" are over thirty years old.
Has the NRA ever backed a bad bill or made a mistake in our view? Are you one of the NRA's paid staff?
They also play it safe by supporting politicians with PROVEN voting records since they have been burned before by two faced opportunists.
From my understanding at the moment and reading the NRA's history, the organization had two incidences where they had revolts in their ranks. They threw out the "sportsman" on two occasions to get to the Second Amendment supporters we have today. It's not the same organization from the 1970's.
It isn't just Peters, evil though she is. It is also politicians like Schumer, Kennedy, Clinton (h), Waxman, Feinstein, Boxer, Owens, etc. And, what's more depressing, is these jerks are not the disease, they're the symptom. It is the liberal morons who make up the majority of the electorate in their oblasts who vote for them who are the real enemy.
So, does that mean that you are a paid apologist or just a volunteer?
Arlen Specter is a reliable politician? Many times when the NRA rates a candidate as an "A", we* refuse to endorse them as acceptable because of their terrible records.
The NRA's paid state coordinators (or whatever their titles happen to be) have supported some terrible anti pro 2nd Amendment bills here in PA and elsewhere.
*'We' is Firearm Owners Against Crime, on the net at:
www.foac-pac.org
And who would those politicians who were rated "A" and have terrible records?
What "Terrible Amendments" have the NRA supported?
The NRA did not under any circumstances support the Brady Bill so you can forget trying to list that one. The U.S. Supreme Court decision against parts of the Brady Bill was funded by the NRA. The court ruled the Federal Government couldn't compel the states to fund a federal regulatory program.
While I am looking up the specifics, can you answer my question?
Are you a bad NRA staffer?
Or tell me why you won't tell me?
PS -- Are you actually defending Arlen Specter as a good choice?
I considered that a stupid question. I'm a machinist for a small fabrication shop.
I couldn't tell you every politician who received an "A" rating or if Arlen Specter received one. Link the information if he did.
For your amusement. Check out the anti-NRA comments.
I didn't think he would post the facts on the question. The anti-NRA crowd always has an excuse to do nothing. They can't find an excuse to do something.
Over the weekend, I bought the book, "NRA, an American Legend". They don't sugarcoat the facts. I was lucky to find it at a discount bookstore. It was well worth the twenty bucks.
I noticed on another thread you wanted someone to answer your question.
Can you answer whether on not Spector has an "A" rating from the NRA? Take your time, I have all weekend.
http://www.nraila.org/Search/Search.aspx
I found this headline:
VOTE FREEDOM FIRST -- VOTE FOR CONGRESSMAN JIM GERLACH (PA-06) ON NOVEMBER 2
[ Also, be sure to vote for other endorsed candidates George Bush for President, Arlen Specter for U... Also, be sure to vote for other endorsed candidates George Bush for President, Arlen Specter for U...]
http://www.nraila.org
The link must be dead because it only took me back to the ILA page. Regardless of the rating -- which I can't find -- Specter was the endorsed candidate.
My turn now. Are you going to argue that Specter was a good choice? Was he the most gun friendly candidate in the race?
I'll give you a clue. He told me -- in front of an audience of over 100 people (about 2 years ago, in the months preceding the primary) -- that he would vote to ban 'assualt weapons' again (meaning he did it before) even though he 'regretted' his vote and the ban was ineffective and violated our rights.
Does that sound like the kind of guy that a pro gun organization should endorse?
Are you a bad NRA staffer?
That should read paid NRA staffer, not bad. Sorry.
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