Republicans Fight Dirty Over NAACP Gun Lawsuit [Republicans fight back with "racism]

Sacramento Observer ^ | 5/5/3 | Ron Walters

[twas]

In case you didn’t know it, while we were watching the war in Iraq, the NAACP was taking care of business, suing gun dealers in order to dramatically slow the carnage in the Black community from the illegal and irresponsible use of guns. But Republicans in Congress are fighting back, using legislation and racism.

African Americans account for 51 percent of gun homicides and there is a well-heeled, illegal sales machine operating in the Black community. It feeds the domestic war over drug sales and turf in many inner cities and it mysteriously goes unabated, while it is common knowledge that these guns are not made in the Black community and are not sold, for the most part, in gun shops that do legitimate commerce.

Recently, a “60 Minutes” television show indicated the U.S. Justice Department could determine, with the help of the Treasury Department’s firearms division, which guns shops sold a disproportionate number of weapons that have turned up in the commission of crimes. It turns out that there is a national database that contains the serial numbers of these weapons, which can be traced back to the manufacturers and, in many cases, to the stores from which they were sold. Why don’t local law enforcement officials have access to this database? It is prohibited from being used by the U.S. attorney general, a big protector of the National Rifle Association (NRA).

This is cold-blooded stuff. Most of us have the movie version of this problem in our heads, where petty drug dealers buy weapons from the neighborhood pawn shop and use them to wipe out their competition. But the truth is often more like the fact that?B> sophisticated weapons are available on a wholesale basis to the leaders of street gangs. In some cases, we are told, availability almost resembles weapons sales made to a small foreign country. That is why it is a problem largely beyond the capacity of local authorities to regulate.

In response to the NAACP’s legal action, Republicans - and some Democrats whose knees shake when the NRA feels threatened - have sponsored bills in both the House and Senate. In the Senate, there is S. 659 and in the House, there is R. 1036; both make it illegal to sue gun manufacturers for the misuse of their product, especially where they do not produce it to be operated safely. That is the standard with regard to every other regulated product on the market.

This amounts to the blatant use of the law, of their majority control of public policy in the Congress, to shield producers of the instruments of death. It is dirty business and it ought to be stopped, yet I hear few elected officials at local levels telling their constituents to fight back.

The Black community needs to fight back because of the racist sentiments held by those who would protect the right of gun manufacturers to flood the Black community, believing that human life is cheap there and that everyone is on drugs. In fact, earlier this month, while H.R. 1036 was being debated on the floor of the House, Rep. Barbara Cubin (R-Wyo.) rose to support it, saying: “My sons are 25 and 30. They are blond-haired and blue-eyed. One amendment today said we could not sell guns to anybody under drug treatment. So does that mean if you go into a Black community, you cannot sell a gun to any Black person…”

Immediately, African American Congressman Mel Watt, (D-N.C.), who was managing the opposition to the bill, moved that Cubin retract the comments. She refused and one of her Republican colleagues moved to lay Watt’s motion on the table - in other words, to cancel it. Watt then moved that a recorded vote be taken.

Cubin finally apologized for her remarks, but what was interesting was that her colleagues supported her by a vote of 227 to 195. While the racist statements by former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott were played up from one end of the country to another, these statements by a House Republican seem to have escaped most of us, or maybe they are so frequent that most people are now hardened when they occur.

Nevertheless, the NAACP has a point, and so we must fight back by making sure that our representatives are contacted to oppose both S. 659 and H.R. 1036 so that the courts could have a fair shot at the suit without having to consider a ban on the legal action imposed by the Congress and the White House.

I said the White House because it is expected that George Bush would sign such legislation, locking in the use of weapons of mass destruction in inner-city neighborhoods while seeking to prevent them from being used in Iraq. If more than 15,000 Black people are killed every year by guns, I would say that the process is slower, but the result is pretty much the same.

[bullseye1911]

10-4 to that!!!

[JoeSixPack1]

Here's one. Why do I care what color of skin a legal, constitutionally approved, gun buyer is?

The answer is "I" don't care. But the NAACP wants me too.

[talleyman]

I learned long ago that the standard operating procedure for the left is to accuse their opponents of what they practice.
"You're a racist" means "I see the world through race-colored glasses."

[demosthenes the elder]

Isn't this actionable on terms of libel or slander?

[demosthenes the elder]

P I N G !

[visualops]

ROFL!

Personally, Sugar Pops are my favorite. I wonder if they're shot from a gun?
Oh, wait. Can't say "sugar", they're "Corn Pops" now.

[JSteff]

"so that the courts could have a fair shot at the suit without having to consider a ban on the legal action imposed by the Congress and the White House."

Translation: "The court is where we can get our liberal agendas enacted without letting it be voted on by the people."

[Grut]

So you would deny me the right of owning a gun just to get your jollies? Feh....

Nope, you can own all the guns you want, as far as I'm concerned. It's the NAACP that's saying you're not responsible enough to do so and the gunmakers could make this clear by acting, or proposing to act, on the NAACP's racist premise.

[William Tell]

OldFriend said: "So the NAACP is saying that the black community is incapable of discipline and is forced to kill themselves because guns are available?"

Perhaps someone has the statistics on murder by knife. Since it would be ridiculous to suggest that there is a conspiracy to make knives more available to blacks, we should observe that the rate of murder by knife is the same in both the white and black communities.

Somehow, I doubt it, though.

[lurky]

suing gun dealers

In the very first sentence, all credibility of rational argument is, well...shot.

[Teacher317]

With Liberals, you MUST wear your opinions on your sleeve, and they must be the proper ones. Failure to raise a PC battle-cry in the first sentence is verboten in their circles. For us, it helps save the time and effort of reading all the tripe if we're not in the mood.

[ninenot]

Actually, blacks were "gun-controlled" from before the Revolution THROUGH about 1950--first through the 2nd Amendment which specified "persons" (you remember that blacks were NOT 'persons,' they were only 2/3rds of a 'person' for most purposes.

Then, after the 14th Amendment and the War of Northern Aggression, blacks were 'gun-controlled' through State Legislatures by various legerdemains and at least partly due to selective enforcement of anti-gun laws.

Only the NRA and the Republican Party have acted to enfranchise black gun-rights with "shall-issue" legislation. It certainly wasn't the NAACP..

[ninenot]

Yeah. "Sheets" Byrd says GWB is a monomaniac for landing on a carrier--and ol' Sheets has 7,235 namesake bridges, highways, and outdoor toilets named for him in W.Va.

The "lust-and-lie" Party thinks Bill Bennett can't control his gambling--demonstrating that THEIR lack of self-control is the real issue.

You are spot-on.

[fieldmarshaldj]

Guns don't kill people, liberals kill people.

[nikiT1973]

I dont think the goverment should be responsible for raising children. If more of us black people made our children take responsability for thier actions instead of defending them and blaming everything on race,eventually they would stop killing each other.
The police dont normaly pick on blacks thats just a copout.Police are scared to pick up black men because they know theyll be accussed of racism. everone knows that the only reason oj got off was because the jury didnt want to be responsible for another L.A.riot.we all knew oj was guilty but black folks are not interested in justice just keeping black men out of prison.Well,it is my feeling that if you do the crime you should do the time.please next time black man gets killed trying to escape after commiting a crime,dont use that as an excuse to steal and riot,that makes us all look like crazed animals,it gives racist white people a GOOD REASON to refer to us as deranged animals who travel in packs

NIKIT

[Ayn Rand wannabe]

while it is common knowledge that these guns are not made in the Black community and are not sold, for the most part, in gun shops that do legitimate commerce.

So if they know that they aren't being sold in "legitimate" stores, then how to they expect to take them off the streets? The only way for more people to stop being hurt is to give the would-be victims a way to fight back.

I've always thought that if they ever succeeded in gun control, people would just go back to using knives and swords, then after those were banned, sharp sticks and rocks.

*Sigh* What a crazy world we live in...

[RogueIsland]

In case you didn’t know it, while we were watching the war in Iraq, the NAACP was taking care of business, suing gun dealers in order to dramatically slow the carnage in the Black community from the illegal and irresponsible use of guns.

Are they going to sue the malt liquor industry, too? Same rationale.