On Sunday gun rights took center stage for Pennsylvania Democrats in the suburbs of Philadelphia and the rural communities of the central part of the state as primary voters debated the meaning of Barack Obama’s statements about what motivates “small-town” voters.
Obama’s challenge: How to reach wealthy liberals in Philadelphia’s suburbs without alienating the central part of the state’s blue-collar masses.
“For Obama to win the state, he has to win the suburbs of Philadelphia big,” said Jon Delano, a Pittsburgh-based political analyst and adjunct policy professor at Carnegie Mellon University.
Delano added, however, that “a third of the Democrats are in southeastern Pennsylvania, a quarter are in southwestern Pennsylvania, and the remaining 40 percent are spread across hundreds of miles in nooks and crannies that require retail politics, and Clinton is very good at retail politics.”
On Sunday morning, members of Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church listened to a sermon calling for an end to gun violence.
“Four hundred people in Philadelphia were killed by gun violence last year,” said the Rev. Dr. Wesley Avram, pastor of the 3,000-member congregation. “Where are you being called to take peace?”
And why is the murder of 400 people in Philadelphia the responsibility of law abiding gun owners? This is the exact way of thinking that's the problem with the Gun Control crowd. They assume that gun owners are these careless maniacs who'll shoot at anything that moves. Thus, their thinking goes, the only solution is to get rid of all the guns.
It's a hypocritical way of thinking. They have no problem throwing the Constitution in your face when you are violating their rights, even in the slightest, yet, they want to ban YOUR rights to own a firearm.
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.
SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED.
It doesn't say "you must wait 5 days to get a firearm", "you must not have been a convicted felon", or any other such things. Those are simply agreed upon rules that law abiding gun owners have compromised upon over the years. Where's the compromise from the gun control advocates? You don't see any do you?
What did the Assault Weapons Ban achieve? Well it made the price of "pre-ban" firearms explode. A 17 round clip that once was $5 turned into $30. A firearm that once cost a mere $500 before the ban shot up to $1,200. These aren't made up numbers either. These are the prices I've paid for weapons and accessories during the AWB.
Well what about the reduction in crime? Not so:
Bethesda, Md.: Is there any evidence that the assault weapons ban reduced crimes committed with these types of guns?
Chris W. Cox: Brady Campaign claims that BATFE firearm trace data says so, but BATFE says it "can in no way vouch for the validity of that claim." And, as pointed out in a very recent report from the Congressional Research Service, "Neither the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) - the principal federal agency charged with the collection of national crime statistics, nor the ATF have endorsed the use of firearms race data for purposes other than assisting in ongoing criminal investigations."
And the drop was not just limited to murder. Overall, violent crime also declined last year, according to the FBI, and the complete statistics carry another surprise for gun control advocates. Guns are used in murder and robbery more frequently then in rapes and aggravated assaults, but after the assault weapons ban ended, the number of murders and robberies fell more than the number of rapes and aggravated assaults.
It's instructive to remember just how passionately the media hyped the dangers of "sunsetting" the ban. Associated Press headlines warned "Gun shops and police officers brace for end of assault weapons ban." It was even part of the presidential campaign: "Kerry blasts lapse of assault weapons ban." An Internet search turned up more than 560 news stories in the first two weeks of September that expressed fear about ending the ban. Yet the news that murder and other violent crime declined last year produced just one very brief paragraph in an insider political newsletter, the Hotline.
The fact that the end of the assault weapons ban didn't create a crime wave should not have surprised anyone. After all, there is not a single published academic study showing that these bans have reduced any type of violent crime.
Even some Republicans can't be counted on to uphold gun owners rights:
Governor Mitt Romney has signed into law a permanent assault weapons ban that he says will make it harder for criminals to get their hands on these guns.
“Deadly assault weapons have no place in Massachusetts,” Romney said, at a bill signing ceremony on July 1 with legislators, sportsmen’s groups and gun safety advocates. “These guns are not made for recreation or self-defense. They are instruments of destruction with the sole purpose of hunting down and killing people.”
Like the federal assault weapons ban, the state ban, put in place in 1998, was scheduled to expire in September. The new law ensures these deadly weapons, including AK-47s, UZIs and Mac-10 rifles, are permanently prohibited in Massachusetts no matter what happens on the federal level.
“We are pleased to mark an important victory in the fight against crime,” said Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey. “The most important job of state government is ensuring public safety. Governor Romney and I are determined to do whatever it takes to stop the flood of dangerous weapons into our cities and towns and to make Massachusetts safer for law-abiding citizens.”
And yet, here we are AGAIN. People don't seem to "get it". So I'll explain it, in plain English.
Gun ownership is a legally protected right that allows a United States citizen to buy any firearm they wish, REGARDLESS OF THEIR REASON TO BUY IT.
It doesn't matter that an AK-47 doesn't make sense for hunting. I've owned one. They are a lot of fun if you're responsible enough to own one. But that's the key point, I'm responsible enough to own one. Sure, there's nut jobs out there that will spray down random people, but there's also people who'd crash their car into a crowd of people, yet we don't ban cars do we?
Of course you're saying to yourself "but cars get us around, so banning them would be stupid". And you'd be right. However, guns can be used for self defense, the defense of others, helping cops out if they are out gunned (rare, but it's happened), hunting, target shooting, and much more. Just because owning a particular firearm doesn't fall into some or all of these categories, doesn't mean that you have a right to tell me I can't own one. Just like I don't have the right to tell you what Constitutional rights you can and can't enjoy.
Travis
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