Just dealing with the 2nd amendment. The author is wrong about the Mass Gun law. It WAS related to the federal law, but NOT in a way that made it expire with the Federal law.
Instead, the Ma. Law was a permanent law, but whose definition of AWB was RESTRICTED by the federal law.
Once the federal law expired, it was expected that either the definition of AWB would stay the same for the Ma. law, or worse, that with no federal law, many more guns would be considered to be part of the Ma. Law.
This is not some after-the-fact excuse. IN fact, this was the argument made by the gun-rights groups in pushing to fix the bill.
Of course, the anti-gun group was also nervous, thinking that there was always a slim possibility that a court would rule that with no more federal law, the “list” of banned guns would be zero. But they weren’t TOO nervous, because the liberal legislature was ready, willing, and able to append a new, large list of guns to the bill.
But the Gun Owners groups pre-empted that, by deciding to accept a list of weapons that was SMALLER than the federal list, thus providing the appearance of compromise while making the law much less onerous. And they got a bunch of other stuff they wanted put in the bill (as the author notes).
Thus, when it came time to sign the bill, the gun-rights groups were ecstatic, calling the bill the greatest pro-gun bill in the state’s history. In fact, the only thing they were upset about was that the signing ceremony claimed the bill was a win for the anti-gun crowd.
They were SO UPSET that their bill was being called anti-gun by the liberals that they castigated Mitt Romney for letting it happen. Yep, they attacked Mitt NOT for the bill, but for letting opponents claim it was an anti-gun bill.
Now here we are 3 years later, and opponents are again falsely claiming the bill was anti-gun. Only now the opponents aren’t lying liberals, but misguided pro-gun people.
McCain's "gun problem" stems from two issues: his successful campaign to enact the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform package and his failed Congressional efforts to regulate all sales at gun shows (conducted in a high-profile partnership with Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman and backed by a group called Americans for Gun Safety, which, by its very name, is enough to earn the instant enmity of many activist gun owners).
The gun lobby and its rank and file view the campaign finance law as an outrageous infringement on their free speech rights while the effort to regulate gun show sales is viewed as a direct attack on the Second Amendment and liberty itself. When McCain was trumpeting both of these issues, the National Rifle Association and other pro-gun organizations reacted as jilted, and increasingly, bitter lovers.
McCain's Gun Problem
Thanks for that post.