gun-fucious
Member
July 23 Neal Knox Update -- Yesterday the House passed the
Commerce-Justice-State appropriations bill including an amendment by
Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.)which reverses many of the licensed firearms
dealer requirements and restrictions imposed in the Clinton era.
The amendment, approved on a 31-30 in the House Appropriations
Committee last week, contains several provisions to protect the
privacy of gun owners.
Reps. Jim Moran (D-Va.) and Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.) had planned to
offer a floor amendment to strike the Tiahrt provisions but filed it
too late, so we don’t have what would have been an educational
recorded vote.
Most significantly, the Tiahrt amendment requires the immediate
destruction of records of approved National Instant Check firearms
purchases – as the NRA-written portion of the Brady Act specifically
provided.
It also prohibits release of multiple handgun sale reports and
firearms trace data, which had been treated as confidential law
enforcement data until a court decision last year.
It puts a stop to BATFE’s growing practice of copying dealer sales
records, putting your name and mine and details of our guns in a
prohibited firearms registration database.
It will allow corporations to apply for “relief from disabilities†to
let a business continue after a change of ownership.
But the bill once again has language prohibiting law-abiding citizens
like Texas gun dealer Tommy Bean (convicted of a Mexican felony for
accidentally taking shotgun shells across the border) from even
asking BATF to restore his gun ownership rights.
By clarifying firearms licensing requirements to eliminate
Clinton-era restrictions not compatible with law it will broaden the
number of qualified gun dealers – which anti-gun groups are screaming
will again allow non-stocking “kitchen table dealers.â€
It would prevent BATFE from finalizing a Clinton administration
proposed rule requiring dealers to do a complete physical inventory
each year, a burden for small businesses.
And to prevent the continued misrepresentation of gun trace data, it
would require BATFE to explain how it is compiled. Violence Policy
Center claims such “disclaimers†would “undermine the utility of such
data†– it would undermine their propaganda.
The Brady Bunch is also screaming about the amendment, including the
trace data explanations – such as their recent release naming “ten
gun dealers who sold incredibly high numbers of guns traced to
crime,†but which didn’t include how many guns those dealers sell.
We can expect an all-out effort to kill these provisions in the Senate.
-------------
There may be an effort today, when the House is to consider the
District of Columbia Appropriation bill, to strike the amendment by
Rep. John Doolittle prohibiting D.C. from spending funds to appeal a
lawsuit against the gun industry.
The provision was adopted last week by the D.C. Committee on a 37-21
vote.
-------------
The unexpected dismissal of the NAACP’s lawsuit against gun makers by
Brooklyn Federal Judge Jack Weinstein last week wasn’t an unqualified
victory for the gun industry.
Larry Keane, V.P. and general counsel of National Shooting Sports
Foundation, and Sturm, Ruger Co. counsel (and now president) Steve
Sanetti told me in Orlando that they fully expected Judge Weinstein
to rule against them – then be reversed on appeal, as he was on a
1999 industry lawsuit.
But in dismissing the suit in a 175-page ruling that blasted the
industry, he made it impossible for the industry to appeal – and
overturn – his outrageous opinion that gunmakers and sellers could be
held liable for the criminal misuse of their products.
A 12-member advisory jury had rejected the allegation that the
industry could be blamed for third-party crimes, but Judge Weinstein
ignored their finding.
He dismissed the suit on the grounds that the NAACP hadn’t
demonstrated that blacks had been more greatly harmed than “the
public at large,†then declared gunmakers had failed "to eliminate or
even appreciably reduce the public nuisance they individually and
collectively have created."
So now we have an unappealable declaration from a Federal court that
the industry has created a “public nuisance†– a finding that will
surely show up in many other lawsuits designed to drive the gun
industry out of existence.
The industry’s Brooklyn “victory†didn’t negate the need for S. 659,
Sen. Larry Craig’s (and 53 other Senators’) bill to stop the
malicious, frivolous liability lawsuits, it made the law even more
essential.
The NAACP case alone is said to have cost the industry more than $10
million. That will be reflected in the prices we pay for new guns –
if they will continue to exist.
S. 659, the Senate twin to a bill that overwhelmingly passed the
House, will be on the floor when Congress returns in September. Call
your Senators’ state offices and find out if he or she is going to
have any town hall meetings during the recess -- so you can let them
know what you think.
-----------
A well-versed friend in California told me this morning that the Gov.
Gray Davis Recall Election – likely to be certified today – has
Democrats laying low on more “gun control.â€
But if Davis survives the recall election, my friend says, the
Democrats intend to prohibit all handgun sales. And he thinks they
have the votes.
If a majority vote to recall Davis, in a special election in
September or October, the same ballot will list who they want to
replace him. Of the possible or probable Republican candidates,
former L.A. Mayor Richard Riordan is anti-gun and so is Actor Arnold
Schwarzenegger (though Republicans are trying to soften his gun
position).
Congressman Darrell Issa, who funded the recall petitions, and
William Simon, a political neophyte who challenged Davis in the last
election, both have said they would work to repeal the string of new
gun laws the Democrat majority has enacted.
The chances of either doing so, if they received a plurality of the
votes cast, are mighty slim, given the makeup of the legislature.
But electing either might put the brakes on the anti-gunners.
Commerce-Justice-State appropriations bill including an amendment by
Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.)which reverses many of the licensed firearms
dealer requirements and restrictions imposed in the Clinton era.
The amendment, approved on a 31-30 in the House Appropriations
Committee last week, contains several provisions to protect the
privacy of gun owners.
Reps. Jim Moran (D-Va.) and Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.) had planned to
offer a floor amendment to strike the Tiahrt provisions but filed it
too late, so we don’t have what would have been an educational
recorded vote.
Most significantly, the Tiahrt amendment requires the immediate
destruction of records of approved National Instant Check firearms
purchases – as the NRA-written portion of the Brady Act specifically
provided.
It also prohibits release of multiple handgun sale reports and
firearms trace data, which had been treated as confidential law
enforcement data until a court decision last year.
It puts a stop to BATFE’s growing practice of copying dealer sales
records, putting your name and mine and details of our guns in a
prohibited firearms registration database.
It will allow corporations to apply for “relief from disabilities†to
let a business continue after a change of ownership.
But the bill once again has language prohibiting law-abiding citizens
like Texas gun dealer Tommy Bean (convicted of a Mexican felony for
accidentally taking shotgun shells across the border) from even
asking BATF to restore his gun ownership rights.
By clarifying firearms licensing requirements to eliminate
Clinton-era restrictions not compatible with law it will broaden the
number of qualified gun dealers – which anti-gun groups are screaming
will again allow non-stocking “kitchen table dealers.â€
It would prevent BATFE from finalizing a Clinton administration
proposed rule requiring dealers to do a complete physical inventory
each year, a burden for small businesses.
And to prevent the continued misrepresentation of gun trace data, it
would require BATFE to explain how it is compiled. Violence Policy
Center claims such “disclaimers†would “undermine the utility of such
data†– it would undermine their propaganda.
The Brady Bunch is also screaming about the amendment, including the
trace data explanations – such as their recent release naming “ten
gun dealers who sold incredibly high numbers of guns traced to
crime,†but which didn’t include how many guns those dealers sell.
We can expect an all-out effort to kill these provisions in the Senate.
-------------
There may be an effort today, when the House is to consider the
District of Columbia Appropriation bill, to strike the amendment by
Rep. John Doolittle prohibiting D.C. from spending funds to appeal a
lawsuit against the gun industry.
The provision was adopted last week by the D.C. Committee on a 37-21
vote.
-------------
The unexpected dismissal of the NAACP’s lawsuit against gun makers by
Brooklyn Federal Judge Jack Weinstein last week wasn’t an unqualified
victory for the gun industry.
Larry Keane, V.P. and general counsel of National Shooting Sports
Foundation, and Sturm, Ruger Co. counsel (and now president) Steve
Sanetti told me in Orlando that they fully expected Judge Weinstein
to rule against them – then be reversed on appeal, as he was on a
1999 industry lawsuit.
But in dismissing the suit in a 175-page ruling that blasted the
industry, he made it impossible for the industry to appeal – and
overturn – his outrageous opinion that gunmakers and sellers could be
held liable for the criminal misuse of their products.
A 12-member advisory jury had rejected the allegation that the
industry could be blamed for third-party crimes, but Judge Weinstein
ignored their finding.
He dismissed the suit on the grounds that the NAACP hadn’t
demonstrated that blacks had been more greatly harmed than “the
public at large,†then declared gunmakers had failed "to eliminate or
even appreciably reduce the public nuisance they individually and
collectively have created."
So now we have an unappealable declaration from a Federal court that
the industry has created a “public nuisance†– a finding that will
surely show up in many other lawsuits designed to drive the gun
industry out of existence.
The industry’s Brooklyn “victory†didn’t negate the need for S. 659,
Sen. Larry Craig’s (and 53 other Senators’) bill to stop the
malicious, frivolous liability lawsuits, it made the law even more
essential.
The NAACP case alone is said to have cost the industry more than $10
million. That will be reflected in the prices we pay for new guns –
if they will continue to exist.
S. 659, the Senate twin to a bill that overwhelmingly passed the
House, will be on the floor when Congress returns in September. Call
your Senators’ state offices and find out if he or she is going to
have any town hall meetings during the recess -- so you can let them
know what you think.
-----------
A well-versed friend in California told me this morning that the Gov.
Gray Davis Recall Election – likely to be certified today – has
Democrats laying low on more “gun control.â€
But if Davis survives the recall election, my friend says, the
Democrats intend to prohibit all handgun sales. And he thinks they
have the votes.
If a majority vote to recall Davis, in a special election in
September or October, the same ballot will list who they want to
replace him. Of the possible or probable Republican candidates,
former L.A. Mayor Richard Riordan is anti-gun and so is Actor Arnold
Schwarzenegger (though Republicans are trying to soften his gun
position).
Congressman Darrell Issa, who funded the recall petitions, and
William Simon, a political neophyte who challenged Davis in the last
election, both have said they would work to repeal the string of new
gun laws the Democrat majority has enacted.
The chances of either doing so, if they received a plurality of the
votes cast, are mighty slim, given the makeup of the legislature.
But electing either might put the brakes on the anti-gunners.
. 