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Romney aims again to explain hunting ('I'm a varmint hunter, not a big game hunter')
AP on Yahoo ^ | 4/5/07 | Emily Udell - ap

Posted on 04/05/2007 7:43:42 PM PDT by NormsRevenge

INDIANAPOLIS - Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is taking a second shot at describing his hunting experience.

The former Massachusetts governor has called himself a lifelong hunter, yet his campaign acknowledged that he has been on just two hunting trips — one when he was 15 and the other just last year.

Campaigning in Indianapolis on Thursday, Romney said he has hunted small game since his youth.

"I'm not a big-game hunter. I've made that very clear," he said. "I've always been a rodent and rabbit hunter. Small varmints, if you will. I began when I was 15 or so and I have hunted those kinds of varmints since then. More than two times."

In Keene, N.H., on Tuesday, Romney had said: "I purchased a gun when I was a young man. I've been a hunter pretty much all my life." The next day, the campaign said Romney hunted rabbits in Idaho with cousins as a teenager and shot quail with GOP donors at a game preserve in Georgia in 2006.

Campaign spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom said Wednesday that Romney wasn't trying to mislead anyone, and he promoted Romney's support of gun-ownership rights.

Romney has also supported gun control. When he ran unsuccessfully for the Senate in 1994 he backed the Brady law and a ban on assault-style rifles. As governor, he supported the state's strict gun-control laws and signed into law one of the nation's tougher assault weapons laws.

He joined the National Rifle Association last August as a "Lifetime" member.


TOPICS: News/Current Events; Political Humor/Cartoons; Politics/Elections; US: Massachusetts
KEYWORDS: antigun; banglist; biggame; guns; hunting; romney; varmint
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To: tiger-one

In Maine you can’t hunt with FMJ.


101 posted on 04/06/2007 9:38:18 AM PDT by Fido969 ("The hardest thing in the world to understand is income tax." - Albert Einstein)
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To: kalee
I consider snakes to be an unwanted varmint. Luckily our neighbor’s cat feels the same way and she kills any she finds in their yard and ours.

That's too bad. They're great animals.

102 posted on 04/06/2007 9:58:47 AM PDT by WFTR (Liberty isn't for cowards)
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To: DBrow; redgirlinabluestate; Pukin Dog; Radix; hometoroost; You Dirty Rats
Remember, he issued “Gay Youth Pride Day” proclamations in 2003 and 2004. If he believes in RKBA based on his GOAL proclamation, what can you say about his support for LGBTQ youth issues and Gay-Straight Alliance clubs in junior high?

Ooooooooooh ... that hurts. I'm trying to prep myself to get enthusiastic about Romney in case he's our only option. McCain and Giuliani aren't options for Republicans and I believe now completetly that for Republicans to nominiate either of them would be so moronic as to make me and millions of others just toss their hands up in the air and say, "To hell with it. The Republican party is dead."

The ONLY, and I mean ONLY ONLY ONLY reason I'd vote for either of them, and it's looking more and more like Romney too, would have to do with appointing judges (a priority which I haven't mentioned in lists I've posted previously, silly me).

And although I admire and have defended Romney's attempts to show that he respects and will uphold the 2nd Amendment, he doesn't have me really convinced because the 2nd isn't about nor has ever been about hunting, it's about DEFENSE. Hunting is irrelevant with regard to the 2nd, and a politician who doesn't demonstrate that he understands that from the git-go, makes me nervous.

THEN you go and post this bit about Gay Youth Pride Day -- and "Gay-Straight Alliance Clubs" for seventh and eight graders no less!!!! That really disgusts me about Romney, absolutely drops him hugely in my regard. Any civilization that strives to normalize homosexuality, is a civilization bent on self-destruction and immorality, period. I have loved and liked many people who are homosexuals, but I cannot and WILL NOT condone homosexuality nor pretend that it is normal or acceptable. If people need to be gay, let them be gay in the closet. I don't want nor need to know about it, and for damned sure CHILDREN don't need to know about it.

It will be very, very difficult for me -- and I expect millions of my fellow conservatives -- to muster any kind of enthusiasm or faith in a guy who believes that "Gay Youth Pride" is of value or that elected officials have any business endorsing it. This is, to me, really REALLY a very big RED FLAG.

103 posted on 04/06/2007 11:29:14 AM PDT by Finny (God continue to Bless President G.W. Bush with wisdom, popularity, safety and success.)
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To: Finny
Finny, I don’t think Romney cares one way or the other about GLBTQ issues except for the potential to get votes.

My point in posting the link to Baywindows was to point out to someone, redgirlinabluestate I think, that just because a governor issues a proclamation, it does not mean that he’s invested in the topic or even cares.

In many cases, an activist group or other bunch of people draft the proclamation (State Pickle and Maple Sugar Day, In Honor of DBrow for Excellent Database Coding, whatever) and lobby the gov to sign it.

So GLESN or PFLAG or some GSA group or GOAL drafts up the text and lobbies for signatures, 90% of the time they get it. GOAL got theirs, PFLAG and GLESN got theirs. There is unfortunately a paucity of Romney proclamations on the official Mass government site- it would be interesting but not terribly informative to see what else he issued proclamations for. You’d think there’d be a list compiled but I fersur could not find it.

Baywindows does have a very interesting Romney page but it does not show that he supported their causes all that much. My overall impression of their Romney library is that he promised all sorts of things to get votes and didn’t come through, I’d be interested in your take.

104 posted on 04/06/2007 11:43:25 AM PDT by DBrow (DBrow(x);DBcol(y))
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To: DBrow

Thank you, DBrow, when I get a chance I will check out your links.


105 posted on 04/06/2007 11:57:13 AM PDT by Finny (God continue to Bless President G.W. Bush with wisdom, popularity, safety and success.)
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To: EternalVigilance

LOL.

Farmboy, fetch me that pitcher...


106 posted on 04/06/2007 2:07:05 PM PDT by sevenbak
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To: WFTR

I go deer and elk hunting every year, duck and goose hunting as well, own 5 guns, but see no place for massive assault weapons in the hands of ordinary, untrained citizens, including myself.

I must admit I own an SKS Russian semi automatic, it’s fun to shoot, but I’m pretty sure it’s not on any banned list.


107 posted on 04/06/2007 2:17:33 PM PDT by sevenbak
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To: Beagle8U
Rodents? Is he out hunting mice and moles?

We'd hunt squirrels from time to time, but even though it was sport to us we'd give them to folks who would use them. 'Varmint' hunting usually meant plinking turtles at the lake.

108 posted on 04/06/2007 2:20:21 PM PDT by lugsoul (Livin' in fear is just another way of dying before your time. - Mike Cooley)
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To: EternalVigilance

This is the equivalent of Dukakis in the tank. There’s just no visuals for it, until somebody Photoshops Mitt’s face onto Elmer Fudd. “Be vewy, vewy quiet, we’re hunting Democwats!”


109 posted on 04/06/2007 3:52:02 PM PDT by hunter112
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To: Nachoman

air gun? can you explain?


110 posted on 04/06/2007 5:23:50 PM PDT by SunnyUsa (No man really becomes a fool until he stops asking questions.)
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To: Boiler Plate

Brilliant!!!


111 posted on 04/06/2007 5:59:43 PM PDT by Gop1040
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To: EternalVigilance

“Who hunts rodents?”

I did as a kid with a 22 at the local dump. We called them rats at the time. Maybe he went hunted at his local GATED dump as a kid too.


112 posted on 04/06/2007 6:07:03 PM PDT by Gop1040
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To: Gop1040

Here in the west, hunting rodents includes potguts, squirrels, and prairie dogs (excpet the endangered ones)


113 posted on 04/06/2007 6:26:18 PM PDT by sevenbak
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To: sevenbak
I go deer and elk hunting every year, duck and goose hunting as well, own 5 guns, but see no place for massive assault weapons in the hands of ordinary, untrained citizens, including myself.

I must admit I own an SKS Russian semi automatic, it’s fun to shoot, but I’m pretty sure it’s not on any banned list.

That's a nice sound byte, but the fact is that "assault weapon" has been defined as any pistol with a magazine capacity of more than 8 or sometimes 10 rounds. Your Russian SKS is functionally almost identical to the rifles that are defined as "massive assault weapons" by those who want to ban "assault weapons." By some people's definition, if you put a synthetic stock on your SKS, it's now an "assault weapon." Are you wrong because you own and enjoy shooting that SKS? Should you be forced to give up that pleasure or go to jail? According to the supporters of these bans, you are wrong to enjoy shooting that gun and you should either give up that weapon or go to jail.

If you are incompetent to handle an AK-47, what makes you competent to handle an SKS? The principles are the same. Don't put your finger on the trigger until you're ready to shoot. Don't point the gun at anything that you don't intend to shoot. Unless you have some reason to keep the gun loaded, keep it unloaded until you are ready to start shooting. If you don't understand something, don't do anything until you've had a chance to ask someone who knows. I'm sure that you know all of these things. There's no reason that you couldn't safely handle anything that people define as an "assault weapon," and if you had a problem, you'd likely have the judgment to solve the problem without hurting yourself or anyone else.

Our society's problem is that too many people just don't have good judgment, and bad judgment makes them dangerous whether they have an AK-47 or an electric toothbrush. Passing assault weapons bans doesn't give them good judgment. The assault weapons ban simply means that good folks have their choices limited once again and the fools are just breaking one more law when they do something stupid.

Bill

114 posted on 04/06/2007 6:27:24 PM PDT by WFTR (Liberty isn't for cowards)
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To: WFTR
As much as I love shooting, I am not a 1 platform voter. Sure I wish Mitt were more like me, but there are greater dangers facing us with very REAL weapons that an assault weapon will not make 1 iota of difference to.

Someone who gets the WOT and has the kahones to back it up (similar to Bush, but with more charisma and brains) is what we need to take on the greatest danger we have ever faced. Hillary wont do it, Obama won’t do it, McCain will let them go and dissolve Gitmo, Guliani will probably do it, but he’s too liberal. Mitt is the man!

115 posted on 04/06/2007 6:33:26 PM PDT by sevenbak
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To: sevenbak
“Here in the west, hunting rodents includes potguts, squirrels, and prairie dogs (excpet the endangered ones)”

Not familiar with potguts (it’s not in the dictionary). Back east (Detroit and Boston) I doubt anyone hunted potguts or prairie dogs. Squirrels maybe, rats more often. But it wasn't called hunting, just plain shooting.

116 posted on 04/06/2007 6:39:31 PM PDT by Gop1040
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To: Gop1040

Potguts are a big furry rodent.

Mitt didn’t say he just hunted rodents BTW.

Unless of course he was talking about the DemoRATS!


117 posted on 04/06/2007 6:48:11 PM PDT by sevenbak
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To: Nachoman

I was leaning toward a Nerf claymore but,, Thanks, Good Idea. ;-)

I may have to go Live trap tho,, I am a compassionate conservative, yaknow.


118 posted on 04/06/2007 7:00:03 PM PDT by NormsRevenge (Semper Fi ...... BumP'n'Run 'Right-Wing Extremist' since 2001)
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To: SunnyUsa

There are many air guns, pistol and rifle, that drive a pellet with enough force to dispatch a squirrel. Very little sound signature, very discrete.


119 posted on 04/06/2007 7:03:56 PM PDT by Nachoman (Tagline input error. Redo from start.)
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To: Nachoman

lol - sounds like a squirrel silencer.... thanks for the info!


120 posted on 04/06/2007 7:05:11 PM PDT by SunnyUsa (No man really becomes a fool until he stops asking questions.)
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