[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

It is not about elections.
Socialism can not stay in
power unless they dis-arm
real people.

[Lazamataz]

We win.

[harpseal]

indexing

[E. Pluribus Unum]

"The first signs came in 1994, after Bill Clinton successfully urged the Democrat-controlled House and Senate to pass legislation outlawing 19 types of "assault" weapons. In November of that year, several Democrats who had supported the ban, including then-House Speaker Tom Foley of Washington, were voted out of office in the Republican sweep."

The AWB renewal is dead.

It is not necessary for Dubya to expound upon the Constiution, the Second Amendment and Patrick Henry the way some knee-jerk "conservatives" demand.

All Congress has to do is ignore it, and they can easily do that if it stays off the radar screen.

[alloysteel]

So which constituency is stronger - those in fear of an inanimate object, which only causes disproportionate harm when misused, or knowledgable users of this same inanimate object, which acts as a personal deterent to assault?

[error99]

"...Proponents knew that all but a small percentage of crimes involving firearms were committed with guns that wouldn't fall under the ban..."
- - -
This sentence is written so poorly that I had to
read it several times and parse it just to figure
out what the author was trying to say.
- -
I think the author gives too much credit to the NRA.
- -
I also think the author mistates what the socialist believe about this issue.
In fact, the socialists do not see this as THEIR failure or as THEIR mistake.
They do not see this as a 'failure of their beliefs',
they see it as a 'failure of the voter' to accept their beliefs.
There is a BIG difference.
They feel they were successful in yet another step in their incrementalism.
In their minds the assault weapons ban might have been a tactical error,
but it has not changed the objective, only the methodology.

[xsrdx]

In Washington, political relevance is what matters most.

Thusly, the NRA remains the most effective progun organization in existence - not that we don't need the others to keep the objective clear.

This is a big article from WSJ, too - not some Drudge/Sierra Times/WorldNet source, this may be an indication of the way things actually are, rather than the way we might wish they were.

Don't quit b/c it ain't over yet BTTT.

[Pylot]

I do not believe for one second that the Dimocrats started aggressive gun control with the AWB for political reasons.

Honest American politicians have nothing to fear regarding guns.

Our founding fathers spelled out the right to keep and bear even though it was already implied in the Constitution. This was done as a means to put a not so subtle warning in place for dis honest American politicians.

The full exercise of the second amendment is the only shield for the rest of the bill of rights and the constitution itself. If you eliminate or negate the second amendment, the rest is just empty words.

My only hope that the AWB will actually sunset lies in the fact that the AWB is scheduled to do so right before the 2004 election. Dimocrats screaming to take your rights away as we lead up to the election is almost too good to be true.

I think you can watch the press act as pit terriers for the Dims as this is the only place you see the topic being raised. A couple of rabid Dims cheer and the rest of them moan and groan.

[PatrioticAmerican]

Headfake?

[Grampa Dave]

Thanks for posting this excellent find and a common sense look at what is happening in Congress.

[hattend]

The bill that recently passed the House would shield gun makers from frivolous lawsuits claiming they're responsible for the criminal misuse of a legal product. Smith & Wesson, Glock and dozens of others are currently being sued in federal court in Brooklyn by gun-control activists and trial lawyers who want to hold them responsible for high homicide rates in poor black neighborhoods.

A jury rejected that claim last week, but the presiding judge, Jack Weinstein, has the final say and is expected to find for the plaintiffs.

Then why have a jury if the judge is going to overrule them? If I'm reading this right, S&W, Glock, and others are the defendants. Is the Senate going to pass the house bill and end this stupidity once and for all?

[Billthedrill]

It shows that the original ban was all about politics, not safety.

Of course it was, but it wasn't entirely the sort of party politics that has the Dems adopting this posture in order to win votes and discarding it when it proved to cost more than it gained. That's a gloss - what was really happening goes much deeper and is becoming a permanent feature of politics not just in the United States, but in democracies worldwide.

It is simply this - the right of self-defense is not easily divorceable from the means of self-defense. Where the means are threatened the right itself comes under question as it has in Great Britain and is in Australia at the moment. One would think it a huge, obvious step from "you may not use firearms to defend yourself" to "you may not defend yourself at all" but in practice it proves nothing of the sort.

In fact, the latter position is the ultimate logical consequence of the assumption that the State is the proper repository of power, and that individual expressions of power such as self-defense only threaten that monopoly. It is tempting to dismiss that as a paranoia of someone whose mental pathology leads him or her imagine that they "need" a firearm; in practice it is neither paranoia nor imagination. The issue is about power - "control" if you will - and it always has been. And it isn't going away.

[Go Gordon]

A jury rejected that claim last week, but the presiding judge, Jack Weinstein, has the final say and is expected to find for the plaintiffs.

What kind of judicial system would we have if all judges were appointed by democrats?

[Destructor]

"It's no surprise that Republicans in Congress aren't eager to renew the ban on certain semiautomatic firearms due to expire next year. What's more interesting is why Democrats aren't raising much of a fuss about it."

They're not? Chuckie Schumer, and Dianne Feinstein are sure raising some hell about renewing the ban.

[Publius6961]

How about "Health Care"?

Will that work?

[I got the rope]

A jury rejected that claim last week, but the presiding judge, Jack Weinstein, has the final say and is expected to find for the plaintiffs. Republicans want to end this indirect assault on gun rights, and some Democrats are now realizing it's in their political interest not to get in the way.

Why does a judge have the final say?

[Duramaximus]

The only thing achieved here is that we won a battle, the outcome of the war is still undecided. The real war is being fought at the state and local level.

Yes, this is good news. But, let's not loose our focus on the real problem. We are one Dumbocrap President away from loosing everything we have.

Then there is the Supreme Court. Newsday is reporting today that at least two justices are considering retirement, Scalia and O'Connor. The Bush administration couldn't successfully secure in the Senate the confirmation of an appointee to an appelate court. The Senate... a cluster of useless pieces of human-debris who call themselves Republicans. What are the odds they will get conservatives in to replace Scallia and O'Connor?

The Supreme Court holds the key to securing our 2nd ammendment rights, and unless things change in the Senate we are in for a rough road.

[cmsgop]

hehe!

[Contra]

Democrats are still talking up gun control, their most recent strategery is to try and draw President Bush into the issue of the House letting the assault weapons ban expire. The President will not be drawn in, however; he says he would support it if renewed, knowing full well it won't be. In a masterful political move, he's having it both ways and the democrats know it (and there's nothing they can do about it).

[Teacher317]

Our suspicion is that the left has learned the hard way that gun control is a political loser. The first signs came in 1994, after Bill Clinton successfully urged the Democrat-controlled House and Senate to pass legislation outlawing 19 types of "assault" weapons. In November of that year, several Democrats who had supported the ban, including then-House Speaker Tom Foley of Washington, were voted out of office in the Republican sweep.

Yesterday on Hannity's radio show, Clinton lackey Sidney Blumenthal said that the reason they lost the House was because of his "good" policies of gun control and health care. An odd spin, to be sure, but he is openly admitting that the issue was key to their defeat.