Posted on 05/12/2002 12:37:08 PM PDT by archy
http://204.228.236.37/Opinion/columnists/story.asp?ID=9958
Popkey: Libertarian wants to serve in D.C. — if he can take his machine gun
Forget Jimmy Stewart in “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.” A newcomer to Idaho politics has another plot in mind. Should Steve Gothard become the first Libertarian ever elected to Congress, his biopic would be called, “Mr. Smith & Wesson goes to Washington.”
Gothard is challenging GOP Rep. Butch Otter and former U.S. Attorney Betty Richardson, a Democrat.
But he says he won´t serve unless he gets a waiver of the District of Columbia´s tough gun-control laws, allowing him to carry his Smith & Wesson .38 special and his Heckler and Koch 9mm machine gun.
“When I´m walking around Washington, D.C., it´s the murder capital of the United States,” said Gothard, a 48-year electrical engineer who designs printers at Hewlett-Packard. “There are terrorists there. I´m scared to death to go there without being armed.”
Last week, Gothard wrote Washington Metropolitan Police Chief Charles Ramsey, asking permission to carry the machine gun as his “primary weapon” and the pistol as his “backup.”
“If elected, I will resign from office if I am not permitted to carry these firearms for my protection within the District of Columbia,” Gothard wrote.
Ramsey hasn´t yet considered the request, but Sgt. Joe Gentile said there is little chance Gothard will get what he wants. “You can´t carry a machine gun in the District of Columbia,” Gentile said. “It´s not in the chief´s hands. He doesn´t have discretion.”
Handguns may be carried legally, but only by a small number of persons whose weapons were registered before the handgun law was enacted in 1976, and who re-registered by 1978. Gentile said the only waivers are granted to law enforcement and security workers. Rifles and shotguns can be legally owned, if licensed.
Gothard said he´d give up Congress if he couldn´t carry his guns because his right to be armed is so central to his libertarian views. “I believe in the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. In order to have the right to life, you must also have the right to protect that life. It´s absolutely fundamental.”
Washington is dangerous. According to the U.S. Justice Department, there were 241 murders in 1999, the last year for which data is available. Boise had two murders that year.
The D.C. murder rate was 46 per 100,000 population, 58 times the 0.8 rate in Boise, but also higher than Detroit (42), Philadelphia (20), Los Angeles (12) and New York (9). The D.C. murder rate has fallen since 1991, when 482 murders produced a rate of 81 per 100,000.
Richardson and Otter said they don´t need guns in D.C.
“I don´t know where Mr. Gothard was raised, but I grew up in Idaho,” Richardson said. “We grow ´em tough in Idaho. I don´t see any need to carry a weapon when I´m in Congress.”
“I can´t think of an incident when, except for 9/11, that I didn´t feel pretty secure,” said Otter, who walks to work from his Capitol Hill home.
Gothard said he´d also like to live on the Hill. He´d ride his bike to work, with his $9,000 machine gun tucked inside his suit coat.
“All the body guards for famous people carry them,” he said. “The Secret Service guys do it, and you´d never know.”
As for other issues, Gothard has adapted his campaign platform from a new book by celebrated free-market economist David R. Henderson, “The Joy of Freedom: An Economist´s Odyssey.”
Gothard acknowledged that he provided The Statesman a copy of his letter to Chief Ramsey, hoping it would lure us to spotlight his other ideas. “I´m not willing to spend a lot of money on my campaign, so I´ll take all the publicity I can get.”
He also acknowledged he wouldn´t be running if the Idaho Libertarian Party hadn´t paid his $300 filing fee. Forty Libertarians are on the Idaho ballot this year, more than in any other state.
Gothard would eliminate public schools and higher education; repeal compulsory school attendance laws; cut taxes by half; end welfare, farm and other subsidies; sell all federal lands, including national parks; and destroy nuclear weapons, perhaps unilaterally.
He´s unworried about the social costs of kids left unschooled. “Parents feed their children now. Why wouldn´t they also educate them?”
On welfare and farm subsidies: “You can´t take my property — which is my paycheck — and give it to someone else who didn´t earn that money. It´s wrong.”
On selling federal lands: “We could pay off the national debt.”
On disarmament: “I go to Japan often, and it´s difficult to face the Japanese, knowing that we bombed two of their cities and killed hundreds of thousands of innocent women and children.”
Henderson, who has corresponded with Gothard by e-mail, told me he also opposes gun control but urged Gothard to re-think his vow to resign from Congress if he can´t pack his guns.
“I would never advise anyone to give up an important office just to be able to carry guns,” said Henderson, a research fellow at the Hoover Institution.
But Gothard said he can´t trust 4,000 D.C. police or the 1,300 U.S. Capitol Police to protect him. “They´re in their stations eating doughnuts; they´re not necessarily with me riding my bike when some terrorist decides he wants to take me out.”
Capitol Police Lt. Dan Nichols said Gothard´s doughnut crack doesn´t deserve a response, but noted, “There are 535 members of Congress who are able to live and work in the Washington area without carrying a firearm.”
Gothard is a Life Member of the National Rifle Association and a Top Gun member at Shooting World, where he met me to show his prowess with the machine gun. Gothard has been shooting since age 6, when his mother taught him in his home state of West Virginia.
He prefers the H&K 9mm, which is stubby and black, with a folding stock.
“This was chosen by the Secret Service to protect the president,” Gothard said. “I think my life is as valuable as his. I want the same weapon that protects him.”
Firing off 30 rounds in less than 3 seconds, Gothard hit an 8 1/2 -by-11-inch piece of paper at 10 yards 25 times.
“That´s not bad,” he said. “There are people who are better than I am, but it´s close enough.”
Edition Date: 05-12-2002
My understanding, though, is that any congresscritter can get U.S. Marshal credentials. Then they can carry anywhere in the U.S.
Is English your second language?
Which part of 'shall not be infringed' are you having problems with?
I can explain it, if you need help.
Well, at least he's got his priorities straight! Who was is that said, "A handgun is what you use to fight your way back to your rifle!"?
Mark
Actually, if I remember correctly, I read that there is a waiver that's given to congress-critters who want to carry concealed weapons... I believe that they become some sort of quasi-federal law enforcement officers, who are allowed to carry.
Mark
Gotta love it.
It is amazing how Libertarians personify the whacked out right and left.
I guess Mr. Gothard thinks his machine gun will protect him from a nuclear weapon launched by Saddam Hussein.
It would be nice if more Libertarians would learn to use these methods to work their way up in government, - from town councils to go straight into national politics.
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