Posted on 05/14/2003 2:32:06 PM PDT by Godebert
By JIM ABRAMS
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON (AP) -
President Bush should take the lead in overcoming resistance within his own party to extending an assault weapons ban due to expire next year, Democrats said Wednesday.
"If the bill dies we will lay it at the president's doorstep," Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said a day after House Majority Leader Tom DeLay told reporters that the 1994 law banning the manufacture of 19 types of common military-style assault weapons would not be renewed.
Schumer said the gun bill would be an issue in the 2004 election, a development that could pose problems for Democrats who represent districts with strong gun rights sentiment. The assault ban vote was also a campaign topic in 1994, the year Republicans recaptured the House after spending 40 years in the minority.
Bush, taking a position at odds with the National Rifle Association, has voiced support for extending the ban, and White House spokesman Ari Fleischer on Wednesday said that support would carry weight in Congress.
"This is a matter that the House has to work out, of course, by listening to the will of its members, but the president's position is clear on it," Fleischer said. "When the president states his position like that, it helps get the message to the Congress."
Fleischer would not say whether Bush would pressure DeLay to bring such a bill up for a vote. DeLay, R-Texas, on Tuesday indicated that there would be no effort to renew the current law before it expires on Sept. 13, 2004. "The votes in the House are not there to reauthorize it," he said.
"The real question is will the president weigh in and ask the leaders to schedule a vote," said Rep. Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill., who as a senior adviser to President Clinton played a key role in guiding the 1994 legislation through Congress.
(Excerpt) Read more at lasvegassun.com ...
Yes, you are.
I'm only this far into the thread (#108), but howling obviously supports the Clinton AWB ban. Chuck Baldwin was right.
Let's hope it never gets to the president's desk and Delay can kill it in the house....because you know who would sign it.
Source and direct quote please.
She is a democrat house member in Texas and decided not to go with her chicken brethren to Oklahoma. I believe that under the Texas constitution that any member of their legislature can be arrested for dereliction of duty, which she was and she was escorted back to the Texas House to fulfill the job she was elected for.
How did you "fight"?
True love is a splendor, no????
Yes, they all DO know where I stand, because I, unlike you, am NOT a dishonest poster.
Admittedly, no manufacturer should have to jump through those hoops, but unless gun owners want the revolution to begin here and now, there's no way around it. The votes are not with the voluble gun lobby.
They need to rustle up some very good spokesmen and completely revamp their PR machine. They need new blood to convince the voting population of the efficacy and necessity of the 2nd Amendment.
And don't bother running to the Constitution for aid and comfort. Hardly any voters know or appreciate its sacrosanctity. And I've yet to run into a 'special interest' group that isn't willing to turn a blind eye to some Constitutional contravention, if it meets with their approval on some issue they don't seem to be as attached to the Constituion on.
There is no such thing as a 'pure bred' Constitutionalist.
Admittedly, no manufacturer should have to jump through those hoops, but unless gun owners want the revolution to begin here and now, there's no way around it. The votes are not with the voluble gun lobby.
They need to rustle up some very good spokesmen and completely revamp their PR machine. They need new blood to convince the voting population of the efficacy and necessity of the 2nd Amendment.
And don't bother running to the Constitution for aid and comfort. Hardly any voters know or appreciate its sacrosanctity. And I've yet to run into a 'special interest' group that isn't willing to turn a blind eye to some Constitutional contravention, if it meets with their approval on some issue they don't seem to be as attached to the Constituion on.
There is no such thing as a 'pure bred' Constitutionalist.
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