Posted on 04/19/2009 6:14:50 PM PDT by Kid Shelleen
Taking his campaign for stronger gun control measures to the national stage, Gov. Rendell squared off with a top National Rifle Association official on national television today over the federal ban on assault weapons.
Speaking on CBSs Face the Nation, Rendell said there was no rational reason to allow the sale of assault weapons. They are used for only one reason to kill and maim people, he said.
Rendell, who has fought unsuccessfully for years in the state Legislature for tougher gun control, revived his efforts following the slayings this month of three Pittsburgh police officers, killed by a man armed with an AK-47 assault rifle.
Hey Eddie, I’ve been waiting for 7 years for you to fix the property tax debacle in Pa. Think you might live up to your “top priority” from your campaign in 2002 and get on that one day?
Killed by his own system of 911 operators and dispatchers who DID NOT INFORM the officers the suspect was armed.
Could have been a shot gun and the results would have been the same.
G-d doesn’t require me to have a “rational reason” to keep and bear under the 2nd Amendment. Gov. Rendell respectfully, you’re a Leftist tool.
Hey Rendell, you smarmy little weasle-here’s what the Constitution of the United States says:
The right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
I realize that for liberal twits that are only concerned with controlling people, that your wish is to usurp the Constitution and twist and mold it to your own Utopian vision. But the real method of changing our governing document is to get 2/3 of congress and 3/4 of the states approval. So maybe we’ll see you in about 1000 years.
Sorry Ed, that pesky 2nd Amendment written by 18th century right-wingers is a mofo. ROFL
Fast Eddie has no intention of fixing anything, except making sure he is Gov fo’ Life.
The link did not work for me.
Here is the link I used from their site.
http://www.philly.com/philly/hp/news_update/43250132.html
Hey, I got relatives in Pennsylvania, which is a truly beautiful state with hills and streams and wonderful hunting and fishing, but I have to ask,
How the heck do you put up with this pompous fascist fathead “Fast Eddie” Rendell? “Philadelphia rules!” is not an answer.
I hunted in PA knowing that semiautos are OK to own but not to hunt with.
Sure love it here in gun friendly South Carolina.
LaPierre said there is no functional difference between an assault weapon and any other gun.
That is unbelievably untrue, said Rendell. Assault weapons sold in stores have tremendously higher amount of fire.
WOW! I didn't know that buying a gun with certain, simple cosmetic differences made my finger faster! I'm so glad I now know what everybody else knows, 'cause apparently everybody knows that assault weapons, which aren't machine guns, have tremendously higher amount of fire.
"everybody" is one stupid bastard
Rendell is an absolute idiot:
“Rendell is not giving up on his efforts to pass statewide gun control legislation. At a press conference in Harrisburg last week, he called on lawmakers to let cities enact their own firearms ordinances and require owners to report when guns are lost or stolen.”
They simply pretend not to understand what the Constitution says.
“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
Yes in fact that is the sole purpose of them Eddie. Especially when those persons are the agents of an oppressive government such as the one Barry Obama is attempting to impose.
The Right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
I try all I can to have him infect my life as little as possible on a daily basis.
Philadelphia rules! is not an answer.
Dear God no, I'm in Pittsburgh area, around here Philly is regarded as "the city of brothers on drugs" in some circles. I prefer Filth-a-delphia.
Can Eddie kill people driving through PA at 100 miles an hour?
Semi-Automatic Firearms and the Assault Weapon Issue |
General Information Semi-automatics account for about 15 percent of the 250+ million privately-owned firearms in the U.S.1 Semi-automatic handguns are used in most defensive gun uses;2 semi-automatic rifles and shotguns are commonly used for hunting;3 semi-automatic rifles (including some that have been labeled as assault weapons) and semi-automatic pistols are the most common firearms in NRA, Civilian Marksmanship Program, International Practical Shooting Confederation, International Defensive Pistol Association and other major marksmanship competitions, and semi-automatic shotguns are widely used for shotgun sports. Semi-automatics are used to defend against crime more often than to commit it4 and, as with other types of firearms, the vast majority are owned by people who dont commit crimes. Semi-automatic firearms fire only one shot when the trigger is pulledlike revolvers, bolt-actions, lever-actions, pump-actions, double-barrels and all other types of firearms except fully-automatics5 (machine guns), the importation and manufacture of which have been prohibited since 1968 and 1986, respectively, and which are otherwise regulated by the National Firearms Act of 1934.6 A semi-automatic also uses energy from a fired shot to operate its loading mechanism. Certain misrepresentations about semi-automatics by groups, politicians and media interests that support gun control warrant correction. Because semi-automatics fire only one shot when the trigger is pulled, they cant spray fire, and they arent designed to be fired from the hip,7 as indicated by the fact that they possess sights, which can be used only if held at eye level. They arent easy to convert into machine guns.8 Federal law, which prohibits manufacturing a machine gun, also prohibits manufacturing an easily convertible firearm, converting a firearm, possessing a converted firearm, and making or possessing a part designed for converting a firearm.9 Semi-automatics, including assault weapons, arent high-powered.10, 11 Power is determined by the ammunition a gun uses, and semi-automatic rifles, shotguns and rimfire handguns use the same ammunition as other guns, while semi-automatic center-fire pistols use ammunition covering the same range of power as center-fire revolvers.12, 13 Assault weapons arent designed for, or used by, the military; theyre not weapons of war; theyre not designed with, equipped with, nor designed to accommodate silencers; and theyre not used by terrorists in Afghanistan and Iraq.14 Our soldiers and the terrorists they fight use fully-automatic rifles. The Beginning of the Assault Weapon Issue and Lies About Machine Gun In 1988, handgun ban activist Josh Sugarmann, then of the New Right Watch (watching the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy before Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., coined the expression), now of the Violence Policy Center (funded by the Joyce Foundation, of which the Democratic Partys candidate for president, Sen. Barack Obama, was a director from 1998-2001), recommended that gun control groups campaign against assault weapons to bolster their long-standing efforts to ban handguns,16 and that they try to trick the public into believing that assault weapons were fully-automatic machine guns designed for the military, because of the way the guns look: [A]ssault weapons . . . will . . . strengthen the handgun restriction lobby . . . . [H]andgun restriction consistently remains a non-issue with the vast majority of legislators, the press, and public. . . . Assault weapons . . . are a new topic. The weapons menacing looks, coupled with the publics confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic assault weaponsanything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine guncan only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons. . . . Efforts to restrict assault weapons are more likely to succeed than those to restrict handguns.17 To bolster the lie, CBS, NBC, CNN and network affiliates deliberately ran videos of fully-automatic firearms (machine guns) during reports on semi-automatic assault weapons.18 The Violence Policy Center uses machine gun photos to spruce up its assault weapon propaganda.19
Under a federal law passed in 1968 (as amended in 1986), the government (in practice, the BATFE) shall authorize a firearm . . . to be imported . . . if the firearm . . . is generally recognized as particularly suitable for or readily adaptable to sporting purposes.23 Under that law, BATF had approved the importation of many firearms, including 43 rifles that gun control groups called assault weapons. In 1989, however, the BATF reversed itself, and prohibited the importation of the 43 rifles on the basis of their having various external attachments, such as a pistol-like grip, a folding stock, or a flash suppressor.24 (The attachments have always been legal on other firearms. For example, all handguns, including those approved for importation, have pistol grips. None of the attachments provides an advantage to a criminal.) Self-defense is the primary purpose of the right to keep and bear arms,25 thus a firearm shouldnt be prohibited from importation on the basis of its relationship to sports. And, any firearm that is legal to manufacture in this country should be eligible for importation. Nevertheless, the importation law focuses on sports. Yet all of the 43 rifles were, at a minimum, readily adaptable to sporting purposes. Comparable U.S.-made rifles dominated most major center-fire rifle marksmanship competitions in this country in 1989, as they do to a greater extent today. The BATF arbitrarily decided that sporting purpose (sic) should properly be given a narrow reading, to include organized marksmanship competition, provided paper targets are used, but not to include combat type competitions. Under that political-purpose-driven standard, the BATF expressly rejected, as non-sporting, the preeminent rifle and pistol marksmanship competitions in the United States, the NRA/Civilian Marksmanship Program National Matches, at which rifles of the type the BATF prohibited from importation are the most commonly used. The National Matches certainly are organized. They were authorized by Congress in 1903 and have been conducted annually ever since.26 And though target material is irrelevant to whether a competition is sporting,27 only paper targets are used at the National Matches. Combat marksmanship competitions are certainly sporting as well. Congress authorized the National Matches to enhance combat marksmanship skills among citizens, particularly those eligible for military service. In 1905, Congress provided support in furtherance of that objective, by passing a law signed by President Theodore Roosevelt, authorizing the sale of surplus military rifles and ammunition to civilians under the rules of the National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice, approved by the War Department. With Americas entry to World War I impending, Congress provided additional support to civilian combat marksmanship training in the National Defense Act of 1916, authorizing the War Department to distribute military arms and ammunition to civilian rifle clubs in support of their training programs, providing funding for military marksmanship instructors to assist the clubs, opening all military rifle ranges to civilians, and creating the Office of the Director of Civilian Marksmanship under the National Board. Under the National Defense Authorization Act of 1996, the Civilian Marksmanship Program continues the mission undertaken a century ago, by selling surplus military rifles and ammunition to members of marksmanship clubs, and co-sponsoring the National Matches. Civilians and military rifle team members have always competed together in the matches, now held at the National Guards Camp Perry Training Site, in Ohio. State Assault Weapon Bans The Brady Campaign calls Californias ban the model for the nation,31 though Californias murder rate increased every year for five years after its 1989 ban, 26 percent overall, while in the rest of the country murder increased 11 percent; and Californias rate has increased 13 percent since its 2000 ban, against a two percent decrease in the rest of the country.32 The Federal Semiautomatic Assault Weapon Ban (the Clinton Gun Ban) (Semi-Automatic Firearms and the Clinton Gun Ban)
The ban, which had been passed by the Senate, was passed by the House by two votes after Speaker Tom Foley (D-Wash.) did not close voting at the end of allotted time, to allow Democrat Party whips to convince several members to vote for the ban.34 The 10-year ban, which began on Sept. 13, 1994, and which was disingenuously named the Recreational Firearms Use Protection Act because it exempted various firearms (a pretense with no tangible effect), defined semi-automatics as assault weapons if they had more than one external attachment.35 In crime-prevention terms, this approach was pointless because, as noted, the attachments are useless to criminals and are common to other firearms. The ban defined large ammunition magazines as those holding more than 10 rounds. For propaganda purposes, President Clinton and the Brady Campaign claimed that the ban reduced the number of assault weapons.36 However, the facts indicate otherwise. The ban did not prohibit guns already made, motivating its Senate sponsor, Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), to say, If I could have gotten 51 votes in the Senate of the United States for an outright ban, picking up every one of them, Mr. and Mrs. America turn them all in, I would have done it. I could not do that. The votes werent there.37 The ban also had no effect on foreign-made assault weapons, such as AK-47s and Uzis, because the BATF had banned their importation in 1989. And it didnt prohibit the importation of magazines holding more than 10 rounds. The ban also didnt prohibit the manufacture of any guns entirely, it prohibited making certain ones with their standard complement of external attachments. Thus, for example, during the ban AR-15s were made with a pistol-like grip, but without a flash suppressor, bayonet mount and, in the case of carbine models, adjustable-length stock. In practical terms the most significant thing about the ban was that it prohibited the manufacture of magazines holding more than 10 rounds, the majority of which are standard-equipment for handguns not defined as assault weapons.38 Rather than reducing the number of military-looking semi-automatics and standard-size magazines, the ban caused their numbers to increase more than they would have otherwise. As the ban approached, consumer demand rose and manufacturers increased production accordingly. And when the ban expired, demand for the original, multi-attachment versions of the guns and the standard magazines soared. Moreover, during the ban, hundreds of thousands of one-attachment versions of the banned guns and millions of imported standard-size magazines were sold.39 Why Congress Refused to Renew the Federal Assault Weapon Ban Moreover, violent crime, which began decreasing three years before the ban, continued decreasing as the number of firearms, including assault weapons and other semi-automatics, increased. This is true whether based upon the Violence Policy Centers proposition that virtually every semi-automatic rifle and shotgun should be considered an assault weapon,46 or its fall-back position, that assault weapon should be redefined to include not only multiple-attachment guns banned in 1994, but one-attachment guns made to comply with the ban.47 Between 1991-2006, U.S. total violent crime and murder rates decreased 38 percent and 42 percent, respectively and preliminary reports from the FBI indicate that rates dropped further in 2007.48 Meanwhile, the number of privately-owned firearms has risen by more than 75 million, about one-third of them being semi-automatics, and about 15 percent of semi-automatics being assault weapons.49 The number of ammunition magazines that hold more than 10 rounds rose by 50 million during the years of the ban alone, according to the bans House sponsor.50 Also, the bans 10-round limit on new ammunition magazines infringed the right of self-defense. Police officers carry multiple standard-size magazines for good reasontheir protection. Other citizens have the same right to protect themselves, and the arbitrary magazine limit potentially put them at a disadvantage against criminals. The limit had other flaws too. Criminals who fire guns fire only three shots on average,51 and those that fire a greater number could defeat a magazine limit by carrying multiple magazines or multiple guns. There was no evidence to justify a limit on magazine size, let alone the arbitrary number of 10 rounds. One can hope that Congress also objected to the truly un-American tone of the rhetorical question that the Brady Campaign repeated ad nauseum during the ban, believing that it alone shouted down any possible opposition to gun prohibition. The question, who needs an assault weapon,?52 was, of course, illegitimate. In America, the burden of proof is not upon those who wish to exercise rights, it is upon those who wish to restrict rights, and there is no evidence that an assault weapon ban reduces crime. An irrational bias against guns, mixed with an assumed sense of intellectual, social or cultural superiority to gun owners, may seem to gun control supporters like sufficient grounds to ban firearms, but such notions are insufficient in a democracy.
Anti-Gun Groups Disagree About The Ban The study for Congress noted, because the banned guns and magazines were never used in more than a fraction of all gun murders, even the maximum theoretically achievable preventive effect of the ban on gun murders is almost certainly too small to detect statistically. The ban couldnt have had an effect on crime, because the attachments it banned have nothing to do with crime. And assault weapons accounted for a smaller share of traces after the ban, because they were no longer a hot political issue, thus there was less interest in tracing them, and BATFE increasingly encouraged traces on other guns. Even the radically anti-gun Violence Policy Center (VPC) said you cant argue with a straight face that the ban has been effective.56 Brady Campaign has even contradicted its own claim, pointing out that the ban only required omitting one or more attachments on guns made during the ban.57 Separately, VPC has incorrectly claimed that one of every five police officers slain in the line of duty between 1998-2001 was killed with an assault weapon.58 Information published by the FBI59 shows that in most of the crimes in question, assault weapons were not involved. Current Efforts to Ban Assault Weapons Notes: 1. Of new guns sold in the U.S. since 1985, semi-automatic handguns have accounted for about 75 percent of handguns and about 30 percent of all guns. Semi-automatic rifles and shotguns have accounted for significant percentages of long guns. Fifty percent of guns imported since 1985 are handguns, the vast majority semi-automatic. (BATFE, Firearms Commerce in the United States, 2001/2002 and Annual Manufacturing and Export Reports, 1998-2006, and U.S. International Trade Commission.) Through 1984, 36 percent of guns in the U.S. were handguns. (Gary Kleck, Targeting Guns, Aldine de Gruyter, 1997, p. 97.) Semi-automatics previously accounted for a smaller share of handguns. 6. The National Firearms Act places strict conditions on acquisition and possession of a machinegun, defined to include any weapon that shoots, is designed to shoot, or can be readily restored to shoot, automatically more than one shot, without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger. (26 U.S.C. 5845) The Gun Control Act prohibited the importation and manufacture of machineguns for sale to private citizens (18 U.S.C. 922d3 and 922o). |
Ed Internal/Eternal Enemy (POS) Rendell BUMP-TO-THE-TOP!
Hey, cut Eddie some slack! As soon as he gets slots approved in Pennsylvania he will address the property tax debacle! sarc/off
Eddie promised to lower property taxes in 2002 and during his last 7 years my prop taxes have gone up 42% with no major improvements. Bottom line, Eddie is a lying SOS who adheres to only one thing and that is the party line.
Where’s video of said debate?
When he says they “are used for only one reason, to kill and maim people” does anyone else besides me find it ironic that dems think this way about an inanimate object, the gun, yet they do support the actual human vile immoral act of killing and maiming not yet born children in their mother’s wombs and consider it a right to do that? What is wrong with these people, killing babies is a made up right, but owning a gun is wrong? Liberals are really mentally defective. They cannot reason. They make no sense. Might be due to the lack of belief on God. They have no moral bedrock to stand on, no core values, no way to know right from wrong. Just a theory.
the real kicker is that when its said that assault 'weapons' are used for only one reason, to kill and maim people ...there outta be a lot more maimed and dead folks layin around... however just from my 1000s of rounds expended it happened yet...
I must be shooting at the wrong 'targets'...just a theory...
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