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USA: "In surprise move, Bush backs renewal of assault weapons ban "

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Hey Ahenry;

I sed: quote:Bush is anti-gun. Don't kid yourself.

U sed: I beg to differ. And I could point you to quite a few things that he has done that agree with me.

I'm all ears, (or eyes, or whatever).

I stand by it. Anxiously awaiting rebuttal.

The current Bush standing by Bush speaks
for it's self. Gimme yours.

Also, on the first point. I'll buy it if we are
talking true libertarians. I guess the forum
defines same as (L)ibertarians. Well, I don't
think I am a true libertarians, but I sure as heck
ain't a Demican, or is that Repulicrat, nor
do I support the Empire.

I am probably best described as a Jeffersonian Democrat.

All that aside. Pulling the libertarian handle
takes votes AWAY from the power stucture.
Yes, you are right. No libertarian will win
a national election. That isn't the point. The point is, that more folks pulling the handle will
make the "fixers" wonder what in the heck
is going wrong.

Yes, I voted for Ed Clark in the first presidential election I was able to
participate in. I also voted for "the madman"
against Clinton/Bush, because Bush betrayed
the entire country with his assault weapons ban.

bad=enemy
 
At the absolute best, Bush is neutral on guns. If he were actually pro-gun-rights, he would have taken steps towards repealing the gun laws already on the books. At the very least he would have expressed his disapproval of those laws. If he's neutral, he would simply leave the gun issue alone. Instead, he has explicitly expressed his intention to enhance the gun laws already on the books.

Now, the two theories that have been put forth on why he did this are:

1) He is cleverly using reverse psychology to gain support so that he can support a small and politically-way-incorrect minority consisting of "assault weapon" owners.

2) He is unconcerned with anyone's rights, and is simply trying to appease the vocal masses by alienating a demonized minority of perceived violent whackos and grab more government power in the process.

Which seems more likely? Keep in mind that he is a career politician.
 
This is politics, not first and goal at the one yard line. Some deception is required to kill the AWB while at the same time not handing a cost-free club to the left wing press and politicians to beat Bush over the head with in front of the soccer moms.
Click to expand...

Boats is right. We can trust Bush, our liberties are in good hands. Go back to sleep, people.
 
FWIW.

With regard to finding a republican sponsor of a renewal bill. There were 38 republicans that voted FOR the ban in 1994.

There were 77 Democrats that voted AGAINST it.

I watched it on C-SPAN. It was a fine example of how our system should work. Instead of the issue being split by party, there were 4 factions in the debate. Republicans for, republicans against. Democrats for, Democrats against.

Even though we lost, I was impressed with the situation.

It is American gun owners fault that the bill got passed to begin with. It will be our fault if it gets renewed.

When a few of us started an effort to get people to contact their politicians, our requests fell on deaf ears. Threads on boards got very few replies or indications of cooperation. Nobody seemed to worry about it.

It may be that President Bush's statement has energized the gun owning community in a way that was impossible by any other means.

At least now, people are making their wishes known and are willing to do something about it. I guess the loss of the veto so many people seemed to count on, served as a wake up call.
 
I made the remark on another board that every day, 534 politicians in Washington DC do everything they can to rob us of our freedoms.

Ron Paul is the only one who doesn't.
 
Wow.

Lots of idealism, serious shotrage of realism.


Bush just told congress where the fight has to be.

If he left congress with the impression that he would veto the law, there are some - perhaps just enough that would take a weasel pass and roll over for a political favor.

Sometimes representatives need to vote one way or another for expediency. Deals are made and people are allowed to vote against things that are going to pass anyway - that way people can still sit well with the dairy advocacy group or whatever.

Bush is sending a clear message that it is up to congress to stop this thing. There is no wiggle room and the House cannot trade AWB passage for political capital in another area with the assumption that Bush will veto it.

The death of the AWB is critical to the health of the Republican party and both GW and Congress know this.

It is much worse for Bush to veto the AWB ban because a lot of people say he does not have a mandate and for him to veteo something passed by the most representative body of congress would be politically...not good.

I actually think this message makes it more likely that the AWB will die.

Bush is stealing a page from Clinton - he is co-opting the lefts agenda and taking a lot of their power with it. The left is going to have a lot of trouble getting traction on this issue with Bush saying he will renew it. They like to use Bush as a touchstone for all that is wrong with right wing America and this is an effective dodge.

I wonder if Boats has not been reading my mind because almost everything I wanted to post, he already said.

Including: I think the LP is worse than worthless. The people who run it are crooks who do not care about winning - they care about getting contributions and matching funds. They are like the "Black Leaders" who keep everyone down and tell them how much they need them.
 
Something from my psychology textbook.

If a minority is united, vocal, and consistent in delivering a simple message, and STAY consistent over time, often the majority will often begin to adopt the policies and ideas of the minority.

The book used the platform of the 1901 Socialist Party, and how we ended up with minimum wage laws, social security, etc.

If THEY can do it, surely WE can?
 
We can trust Bush? Our liberties are in good hands?

Golly, I should bend down and lick the fingers of the king who allows me to keep a portion of my paycheck and then thank him for allowing me to have that which he deems necessary.

Let's see:

1. Largest increase in federal government in recent, if not entire, US history. Not to mention a reorganization which has manifested itself in more strict control of citizens and almost complete disregard for border security (real border security, I'm not talking about the extra officials at the "formal" border crossings).
2. Huge increase in federal spending.
3. Largest step towards total surveillance of the general populace.
4. Sweeping police powers (short-term, or so they said until the Republicans have recently decided to try for an extension of the new federal police powers to "fight terrorism"). See Patriot Act and Patriot Act II.
5. Increasing militarization of local law enforcement (with federal money, of course).

Where have I seen or heard of these things before . . . .oh, yeah - in every fledgling police state in history.


I prefer to distrust any elected official. I used to mostly distrust the liberal Democrat, now I distrust the republicans far more because most people actually believe that they have "our bests interests in mind" and that they are actually conservative.

I agree, though, that we don't have to worry about Bush. If I recall, that grand old document starts, "We the People . . . "
 
Dog3,

I asked you to show me actions that Bush has taken that indicate he is anti-gun, since you refuse to do so I am not going to waste my time pointing you to the myriad of reasons I have that indicate to me that Bush is actually pro-gun. I will leave you with just one, he signed the Texas Concealed Carry License.
 
ahenry,

I asked you to show me actions that Bush has taken that indicate he is anti-gun
Click to expand...

Repeated vocal support of the AW ban.
Support on his campaign platform of enlarging the AW ban.

Sure, Bush supports your right to own a .38 snubbie (if you jump through all those Texian hoops for a CCW), but a Militia Rifle? Not a chance, bro!
 
Sorry Tamara. I specifically asked for actions. For instance, if we were discussion George H. Bush, I’d agree that based on both words and actions, we might not have much of a friend. Given that George W. Bush is a politician and everything that comes out of a politician’s mouth has to be filtered through a political road map, looking at actions becomes important. What do his actions say? Its a simple question.
 
ahenry,

Okay, other than signing the (relatively lame compared to most other states) Texas CCW law, what do his actions say? ;)

(Looking for actions from a politician is like looking for flying from a fish: it happens, but it ain't the norm. ;) )
 
Okay, other than signing the (relatively lame compared to most other states) Texas CCW law, what do his actions say?
Click to expand...
Now I could swear you and I have had this exact same conversation back on TFL...

Since I don’t actually think you are interested (since I do believe we discussed this once before), I’ll just say his actions (lame or not, he just gets to sign the bills not write them) suggest he is more pro than any president we have had in more than our lifetimes (and probably yours and mine combined).

I’ve shown you hard factual actions that indicate I might know what I’m talking about. I’m still waiting for you to show me actions that he has done that show you do. ;)
 
Newsflash:

Governors do not pass legislation.

If the CCW bill was lame, that can hardly be pinned on him. From what I understand, it was an improvement and allowed more people to carry.

Sad to say, there are people here who would call him an anti gun politicial for not grandstanding and refusing to sign the law because it was too restrictive, etc.

Get back on your meds.:rolleyes:

The fact is, other than this special little corner of the world, the majority of people have some degree of fear associated with guns. And with drugs, and lots of other things that the smartest citizens rightly regard as matters of liberty.

Those who espouse unappologetic 2ndA absolutism are a tiny minority of the population and you scare the bejesus out of everyone else. That you are right is of almost no consequence. The power structure would be happy to beat you down with the approval of a lot of people who consider themselves "good Americans".

The Antis love to talk about a world without guns - just like we love to talk about a world without gunlaws. Both are 100% impossible. Just like a ruling Libertarian Party.

If you want a real libertarian government, you are delusional if you think it can even happen in your lifetime. You need to take over the schools, the water districts, the newspapers, the medical establishment and have a few billionaires on your side. Even then, you will have to undo 100 years of socialist brainwashing and come up with something better than "freedom is messy, learn to love it".

I saw some idiots on the news protesting that their taxes were too low and could sombody please raise them (!!!!!)

Our country is fat and prosperous and we generally prefer the luxurious fun life to the "animating contest of freedom". Most people just want to get laid, drive a cool car, wear cool clothes and play video games.

Yes, a total rollback of the AWB, and all other federal gun laws would compell most of us to start a new religion with GW as the central object of worship, but it just aint going to happen. It would freak everyone out, it would throw the leftist back into power so fast, it would make your head spin.

The best we could ever do in our lifetime would be to get a Roe v Wade style watershed ruling from the SC.

Oh - but to do that, we need to actually get a majority of judges on the SC that believe in the 2ndA. I have not kept track of all of them, but from what I have seen, GW tries to appoint "strict constructionists" (more or less, mostly more) and the dems are positively sacrificing their political lives to try and stop the appointments in a way that is unprecidented.

They know that if we get a solid majority of people who think the Constitution says what it means, they are done. Game over.

If you think the Democrats and the Republicans are the same, you are blind. Look at the courts, look at the judges - the courts are where most of our rights are won and lost ultimately.

Regardless of how far short of your ideal GW falls, he is trying to appoint judges that are a lot more sympathetic to your views than any Democrat will ever dream of doing. So if you go off on your little altruistic LP kick, you are not just allowing 4 years of "the same thing", you are opening the gates for more wacked out liberal communist judges to get on the bench and evacuate their vicera all over the Constitution.
 
It is much worse for Bush to veto the AWB ban because a lot of people say he does not have a mandate and for him to veteo something passed by the most representative body of congress would be politically...not good.
Click to expand...

Whatever happened to "checks and balances".

I guess that all disapeared with the "end of gridlock" and "bipartisanship" rhetoric of the past 15 odd years.....
 
This is about checks and ballances.

From a political stand point, the House is the body that is most "democratic" and is the closest thing to direct representation.

Many people see GW as not having a "mandate" due to the Florida fiasco. ("Hail to the Thief", "President Select", etc)

This AWB is going to be killed by Republicans, but if the House passes the renewal, and GW vetoes it, it will not matter - you will not have been let down by GW, you will be let down by everyone.

The antis will have an absolute pic-nic over this. The parade of victims and human debris will be without equal - because if it is renewed, it will be RIGHT before the presidential election and the left has NO ISSUE right now.

Politically, GW knows the score, and he is telling Republicans that they have to kill this in the House - they absolutely have to if they want it dead.

GW has almost nothing to do with it passing or not - if it does pass the House, then the Republicans might as well just hand everything back to the Democrats.

If you think they do not know this, you are insane. They know why GW won - or more, why Gore lost and they know why we cleaned house in 94 and they know what the score is for people who were pro gun - pro gun people get elected. Anti gun people go home and get a real job.

Both parties are made up of factions of groups that are loyal to a single issue - the Democrats way more than the Republicans, but still, there are people who are Republicans only because they percieve the Repubs as for lower taxes, pro business, etc. Not everyone is all "rah rah! guns for all!" - some of them just nervously tolerate the gun people because it means they get their issue heard. It depends on the area of the country and how the issue happens to be framed at the moment and if any kids got shot this week, etc.

If Bush takes a hardline on guns - one way or the other, it does not help him - it only hurts him. By playing the center, he avoids energizing the MMM. He avoids having about a million Op-Ed pieces written by hand wringing mommies who fear there will be more machineguns in little tommys school - and isn't Bush a horrible war monger who wants everyone killed, etc.

Watch what he does, ignore most of what he says. Look at the heat Ashcroft takes over his stance on guns. He is constantly painted to be a total lunatic for his position on guns (he may be a lunatic, but for other reasons).

Do you really think that a President who was at all Anti would appoint Ashcroft or Condi Rice?

This is politics in America in the 21st Century. At least 20% of the country is completely incapable of handling any more freedom than they got right now, and twice that many get scared REAL easy.

If you want the AWB to die, write your congress person. Give GW a break in the mean time.
 
Ahenry,

Don't get so testy man. I made a flat statement
that Bush is anti-gun, you said you disagree
and offered to show why. I asked you to
go ahead and do that thing. I never said
I go point and counterpoint as to why I feel
Bush is anti.

As to the CCW issue. The *ONLY* thing CCW
is, in my book. Is the state granting permission
to exercise a right that they have no moral
control over in the first place.

A politician that is pro CCW is not necessarily
pro-gun. They are however, certainly and
demonstratably pro gun control, because
that is what ccw really is.

CCW *IS* gun control.
 
Totally agree with Pendragon.

(Pendragon) This is politics in America in the 21st Century. At least 20% of the country is completely incapable of handling any more freedom than they got right now, and twice that many get scared REAL easy.

I'd extend that to say that at least 20% of the country is completely incapable of handling the freedom it already has.
 
I think that as things now stand the AWB has little chance to reach GWB's desk. However it will only take another Coumbine or Beltway style shooting incident to turn the whole situation against us. GWB missed a golden opportunity to curry favor with the gun rights community when his administration came out in opposition of the Armed Airlines Pilots Bills. Even the anti's had little heartburn over that issue. What was he thinking? Al
 
Guns in cockpits is a hard sell even after 9/11.

Much of the public believes that a gun can "just go off" and that a hole in the plane will suck everyone out :rolleyes:

Yes, it makes sense to us, but you cannot make it to the 20 yard line without passing the 50th, 40th then the 30th.

In political terms, that goal was not worth the cost at that time, and in that environment.

We simply cannot have the Pollyanna view that says to be "on our side", you have to come out with a hard line 2ndA absolutist position on ever issue involving guns. You have to work strategically and behind the scenes and pick battles that you can actually win and survive to win more battles.

This notion of the politician who never backs down, who fights for guns at every turn regardless of the cost - they do not exist, mostly because those kinds of people are not capable of getting elected dog catcher let alone President. Ron Paul perhaps being one of the very very few exceptions in the last 50 years. Chalk that up to convergence of unlikely conditions - regardless, it is nothing approaching a trend.

If you want sweeping victory, it will only come from the USSC, and the only person who has a prayer of electing the right kind of jurists is GW. That is an undenyable fact.
 
Aaron,

Do you believe that words are not, to a certain extent, actions? Do his words not have repurcussions?

If he really is pro-gun, why the hell bring up the issue in the first place, what purpose does it serve? The only reason I can see for this is that he might be trying to cozy up to socialist soccer moms and crunchie granola heads who're peeved at him for the war. Why was he so fiercly opposed to armed pilots?

He could have simply not said anything, both with the AW ban and with the pilot issue, and he wouldn't be actively working against RKBA reedom. If he really supported the hell out of RKBA, he could just say that it's garbage and that he'd veto it. Do you think Congress could override his veto?

He won't do that because he's afraid of the political effects from doing so, but that wouldn't bother someone who really believed in the issue.

He's, like all politicians, worried about his image.

It's all about votes after all.
 
After my father died I became executor of his estate. One of the task for which I paid an attorney's services was to place a notice to creditor . . . . . . guess where the ad was placed. In the smallest, most inconsequential periodical in the city. Why? Because the law required notice to creditors. Didn't say anything about how effective the notice had to be.

Shift to this story. If Bush was making a policy statement and was interested in making points with major blocs of voters, he could have had front page coverage in a dozen national papers and top of the hour coverage in electronic media. He didn't. He used a back wood periodical and a no name reporter.

Conclusion? He knows the AWB won't make it past the House. So he can throw a bone to the anti-2's AT NO REAL COST TO HIS base. Participants on the THR and other boards tend to being principaled individuals, the anthesis of a politician.

Bush is acting like a politican now. Forget the memories of principaled foreign leadership. It ain't gonna happen stateside.
 
Personally, I think the biggest consideration behind anything Bush does or says it the fact that he is very inarticulate. He can do well when reading a speech from a teleprompter, and after may hours of practice. That one today was good.

But on the fly, Bush leaves a lot to be desired. Prior to the Gulf War, when pressured about going into Iraq, he slipped and said "this is the man that tried to kill my dad". His followers get offended when someone tries to imply revenge was the motive for action in Iraq.

So any heated subject, arming pilots, renewing the ban, vetoing an education bill, etc., will be approached from that viewpoint; what is easiest to explain.

When Ted Kennedy sent an education bill loaded with pork and devoid of what Bush wanted to do, Bush signed it. It was easier to sign it than to explain to a screaming liberal media why he vetoed it.

It will be the same with any hot topic. By announcing support of the ban, he doesn't get grilled every time he takes questions. With 80+% of the media being liberal, it is better for him to take the path of least harassment.

Imagine President Bush trying to explain during a debate in 2004 why he opposed the ban. Now, the question won't even come up.

This is a president that gets praised by conservatives for signing liberal sponsored legislation in order to "take the issue away from the Democrats". HUH!? WTH.

So by taking the Democrats side on an issue, he takes it away from them. A tactic that someone who is "oratorically challenged" needs to use frequently.

That is what we get for hooking our wagon to a big dud. What is with the republican party? Dole in 96 Bush in 2000.
 
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