AnotherMcIntosh
AnotherMcIntosh's JournalIs it true that Republicans oppose gun control while all or most Democrats favor gun control?
In 1994, when the Assault Weapons Ban was passed as a key part of H.R. 3355, the author of The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, to which it was attached, was a Democrat from Texas. (Earlier before editing this post, because of my own ignorance, I misidentified Jack Brooks as a Republican. Mea culpa.)
Because 95.7% of the Republican Senators voted in favor the AWB when the vote was taken, although there is no record of the House votes where only a voice vote was taken in the House of Representatives, no one can seriously claim that all or most of the Republican Representatives were opposed to the passage of the AWB.
The 95.7% of the Republican Senators who voted in favor of the AWB include Richard Shelby (AL), Frank Murkowski, Ted Stevens (AK), JOHN MCCAIN (AZ), Christopher Bond (MO), Conrad Burns (MT), Judd Gregg, Bob Smith (NH), Pete Domenici (NM), Alfonse D'Amato (NY), Duncan Faircloth, Jesse Helms (NC), Don Nickles (OK), Robert Packwood (OR), Arlen Specter (PA), John Chafee (RI), J. Thurmond (SC), Larry Pressler (SD), Kay Hutchison (TX), George Brown, Ben Campbell (CO), William Roth (DE), Connie MAck (FL), Paul Coverdell (GA), Larry Craig, Dirk Kempthorne (ID), Daniel Coats, Richard Lugar (IN), Charles Grassley (IA), Bob Dole, Nancy Kassebaum (KS), Mitch McConnell (KY), William Cohen (ME), Thad Cochran, Trent Lott (MS), Robert Bennett, Orrin Hatch (UT), James Jeffords (VT), John Warner (VA), T. Gorton (WA), Alan Simpson, Malcolm Wallop (WY).
Their 1994 position was consistent with Nixon's 1969 position, who told the journalist William Safire at that time that "he favored making handguns illegal and requiring licenses for hunting rifles."
http://bsalert.com/artsearch.php?fn=2&as=2471&dt=1
Their 1994 position was consistent with Bush-41's 1989 position:
http://bsalert.com/artsearch.php?fn=2&as=2471&dt=1
Their 1994 position was also consistent with Reagan's 1991 position:
http://bsalert.com/artsearch.php?fn=2&as=2471&dt=1
In 2008, when three Republican Representatives sponsored a Bill to extend the AWB, and acted alone with no Democratic Sponsor, the following Democrats signed a letter to AG Holder to express their strong opposition to extending the AWB:
Mike Ross (D-AR), Tim Holden (D-PA), Jerry Costello (D-IL), Jim Matheson (D-UT), Sanford Bishop (D-GA), John Dingell (D-MI), Marion Berry (D-AR), Nick Rahall (D-WV), Gene Green (D-TX), Chet Edwards (D-TX), Ciro Rodriguez (D-TX), Gene Taylor (D-MS), Bart Stupak (D-MI), Collin Peterson (D-MN), John Tanner (D-TN), Allen Boyd (D-FL), Dennis Cardoza (D-CA), Eric Massa (D-NY), Steve Kagen, MD (D-WI), Betsy Markey (D-CO), Paul Hodes (D-NH), Ron Kind (D-WI), Peter Welch (D-VT), Leonard Boswell (D-IA), Tim Ryan (D-OH), Walt Minnick (D-ID), John Boccieri (D-OH), Joe Donnelly (D-IN), Tom Perriello (D-VA), Earl Pomeroy (D-ND), Ben Chandler (D-KY), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), Debbie Halvorson (D-IL), Travis Childers (D-MS), Tim Walz (D-MN), Peter DeFazio (D-OR), Solomon Ortiz (D-TX), Paul Kanjorski (D-PA), Rick Boucher (D-VA), Mike McIntyre (D-NC), John Murtha (D-PA), Bart Gordon (D-TN), Zach Space (D-OH), Alan Mollohan (D-WV), Lincoln Davis (D-TN), Artur Davis (D-AL), Charlie Melancon (D-LA), John Barrow (D-GA), Christopher Carney (D-PA), Dan Boren (D-OK), Parker Griffith (D-AL), Charlie Wilson (D-OH), Heath Shuler (D-NC), Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (D-SD), Jim Marshall (D-GA), Jason Altmire (D-PA), Larry Kissell (D-NC), John Salazar (D-CO), Brad Ellsworth (D-IN),
Frank Kratovil (D-MD), Glenn Nye (D-VA), Bobby Bright (D-AL), Ann Kirkpatrick (D-AZ), Joe Baca (D-CA).
http://bsalert.com/artsearch.php?fn=2&as=2471&dt=1
So for the anti-gunners, what is wrong with Bill Clinton's analysis?
In his book "My Life," in which he analyzed the loss of Congress to the Republicans in 1994, he wrote:
"On November 8, we got the living daylights beat out of us, losing eight Senate races and fifty-four House seats, the largest defeat for our party since 1946....The NRA had a great night. They beat both Speaker Tom Foley and Jack Brooks, two of the ablest members of Congress, who had warned me this would happen. Foley was the first Speaker to be defeated in more than a century. Jack Brooks had supported the NRA for years and had led the fight against the assault weapons ban in the House, but as chairman of the Judiciary Committee he had voted for the overall crime bill even after the ban was put into it. The NRA was an unforgiving master: one strike and you're out. The gun lobby claimed to have defeated nineteen of the twenty-four members on its hit list. They did at least that much damage...." (Pages 629-630)
http://www.gunshopfinder.com/legislativenews/clinton8_1_04.html
Why, exactly, are you crusading for a revival of the 1993 issue?
ACLU files another lawsuit against LA County sheriff who faces mounting legal problems
...
Bad news in the past week has come from his own brass, his chief critics and a photo that surfaced in an unrelated federal investigation - all serving to sully the reputation of the popular four-term sheriff, who enjoys the limelight and is flown around the world at the invitation of others to talk about policing tactics.
...
Last year the civil rights group released a report that documented more than 70 cases of alleged abuse and other misconduct by deputies, many of which occurred at Men's Central Jail. The FBI has launched its own investigation and asked for internal department records dealing with inmate abuse.
On July 6, Capt. Michael Bornman testified before a county commission looking into deputy abuse in the jails that the former head of the jail, Capt. Daniel Cruz, resisted efforts to investigate employees who were accused of excessive force. Bornman described a culture of brutality where Cruz allegedly joked about not hitting inmates in their face so marks wouldn't be visible. Cruz has denied the accusations.
http://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/LA-County-sheriff-faces-mounting-legal-problems-3707561.php
Group-think and profits allowed Sandusky's pedophilia at Penn State to continue for 14 years.
In June, a US jury convicted former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky Friday on 45 of 48 counts in a child sex abuse case.
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/us-coach-guilty-most-counts-pedophilia-case-media-031026792--nfl.html
A report just issued by a team led by former federal judge and FBI director Louis Freeh has been released showing how other Penn State officials were influenced by group-think and profits to not take action in response to Sandusky's sex activities with children.
The report is a lengthy one. Freeh's firm interviewed hundreds of people to learn how the university responded to warning signs that its once-revered former defensive coordinator -- a man who helped Hall of Fame football coach Joe Paterno win two national titles while touting "success with honor" -- was a serial child molester.
http://www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/pdf/2012/REPORT_FINAL_071212.pdf
Fresno police drowned father by Tasering him, hogtying him, then sticking a garden hose
"onto (his) face and mouth" when he pleaded for water.
When the police responding to a domestic disturbance call, as witness by the man's children who they say was not armed and had committed no crime, the police pepper-sprayed their father and then Tasered him a “countless number of times.” The children also observed that while their father was hogtied, handcuffed, and faced down in their backyard, one of the cops kept his knee on their father's back.
http://www.courthousenews.com/2012/04/10/45478.htm
Then, according to the information from the federal complaint:
“After turning the water off, the Doe Officer(s) continued to press his knee against decedent’s back and continued to put pressure on it. Witnesses repeatedly asked officers to let decedent get up because he couldn’t breathe, but their cries for help were ignored. “By now there were in excess of 15 deputies and officers on the scene.
...
“Officers, after much pleading from witnesses, checked decedent’s pulse and discovered he had stopped breathing after not feeling anything when they touched decedent’s neck. “Decedent had his handcuffs taken off and was untied and placed on his back on the ground. After some time had passed, an officer started doing chest compressions but none of the officers administered mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to the decedent. Ultimately a witness at the scene administered CPR to decedent. “Some time later, an ambulance arrived and took over trying to revive decedent.”
http://theduckshoot.com/blog/californian-cops-pepper-sprayed-tasered-drowned-innocent-father/
It's Not Power That Corrupts, It's Excessive Deference
Conor Friedersdorf :
...
What cannot be squared ... is the insight that leader worship makes it harder for people in power to behave honorably, and the simultaneous argument that we need to be more admiring of our leaders. I do not mean that we should be disrespectful or them, nor of any other human being.
But we ought to be skeptical of their intentions, knowing that power corrupts; and we ought to challenge them, for if having worshipful sycophants inflates one's self-importance, what better corrective than dissenters confident enough to convey that the leader has erred in his or her judgment?
...
the best leaders are at once willing to act decisively and prone to humility and introspection. They are attuned to the possibility that they too are fallible. Sycophants destroy that perspective.
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/06/excessive-deference-to-leaders-corrupts-them/259164/?google_editors_picks=true#
Presence of Multi-nationals in Greece may be Affected by Arson Assault of Microsoft's HQ in Athens.
A coordinated arson assault by armed gunmen against Microsoft's HQ in Athens earlier this morning is another headache for big multi-nationals in Athens. Reportedly, multi-national corporations have already been considered leaving the debt-ridden country because of unpaid bills, falling revenues and the prospect that Greece might be forced to leave the euro.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/sns-rt-us-greecebre85q0ze-20120627,0,5686655.story
This morning's attack is the latest one against a multi-national corporation. Protesting Greeks had already set fire to branches of Macdonald's, Citi and Starbucks in Athens.
Oakland officials agree that cop did nothing wrong and shows contempt for Federal judge's decision
On a 5 to 3 vote, the Oakland City Council acted contrary to a Federal judge's order and authorized the transfer of public funds to reimburse a cop for damages which the judge ordered him to personally pay.
Last year, after a bench trial, U.S. District Judge Marilyn Hall Patel found that a particular Oakland cop conducted an illegal strip search an a busy West Oakland public street to humiliate two individuals who were stopped for no lawful reason. As Judge Patel wrote in her opinion, after the cop and his partner used a pretext to stop the driver,
http://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/Oakland-to-pay-cop-s-40K-strip-search-judgment-3649123.php
The cop's junior partner followed his direction and similarly conducted a public-humiliation strip search of the second individual while the crowd continued to watch.
When Judge Patel rendered her judgment, she both (1) ordered the City of Oakland to pay $105,000 in compensatory damages to the first individual and $100,000 to the second one, and (2) ordered the cop to personally pay $25,000 out of his own pocket to the first individual and $15,000 to the second one.
Since the time that the order was entered requiring the personal payment of the $40,000 by the Oakland cop, his attorney sought to have the City of Oakland reimburse the cop for the damages that he was ordered to personally pay.
When the Oakland City Council vote was taken, they agreed with the Police Department's internal affairs office and the cop's attorney. They agreed to transfer the funds while undermining the judge's ruling.
Vague portion of Chicago anti-gun ordinance struck down by Federal judge
U.S. District Judge Samuel Der-Yeghiayan recently ruled that Chicago's 2010 anti-gun ordinance (passed just days after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the city's 28-year ban on handguns) is unconstitutionally vague to the extent that it prohibits a person previously convicted of any "unlawful use of a weapon" from being issued a firearm permit.
The judge based his ruling on the fact that Chicago's ordinance does not adequately define "unlawful use of a weapon," and the phrase "unlawful use of a weapon" can mean different things to different people in different jurisdictions.
"The same Constitution that protects people's right to bear arms prohibits this type of indiscriminate and arbitrary governmental regulation," he continued. "It is the opinion of this court that any attempt to dilute or restrict a core constitutional right with justifications that do not have a basis in history and tradition is inherently suspect."
...
"The only thing Mr. Gowder did was to own a firearm. As a result, he was treated like a criminal by the city of Chicago when all he did was exercise his fundamental Second Amendment right," said Stephen Kolodziej, a Chicago attorney representing the plaintiff. "We think the city of Chicago's actions in denying Mr. Gowder a firearm permit were punitive and draconian as well as violative of his constitutional right to keep and bear arms."
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-chicago-gun-law-20120620,0,3472302.story
At least four additional pending lawsuits are challenging other portions of Chicago's ordinance. Earlier, in 2010, the Supreme Court ruled in McDonald v. Chicago that the city's ban of gun ownership by citizens was unconstitutional.
http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/09pdf/08-1521.pdf
Accounting firm that helped clients evade $1.3 billion in taxes agrees to pay 25% of its fees from
such services (or $50 million out of $200 million in fees) in order to enter into a deferred prosecution agreement and settle the IRS' claims against it.
Michael Rapoport of the WSJ:
The U.S. Attorney's Office in Manhattan said BDO developed and sold illegal tax shelters, known as "Short Sale" and "SOS," to wealthy clients that generated at least $6.5 billion in phony tax losses from 1997 to 2003. BDO said it received about $200 million in fees from those transactions.
The firm falsely characterized the shelters as investments, used false and fraudulent correspondence and other documents to mask the products and associated fees, filed false tax returns and provided false information and documents to the Internal Revenue Service, prosecutors said.
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20120613-716301.html
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