Examiner – by Dave Workman The 15-page gun control initiative filed yesterday in Olympia will get national attention for several reasons, but perhaps the most important of those is because billionaire New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s Mayors Against Illegal Guns (MAIG) may want to see how it works here before trying it somewhere else.
The Secretary of State’s office notes shooting victim Cheryl Stumbo as the person who filed, but behind this effort is the Washington Alliance for Gun Responsibility. The document is on-line thanks to the Seattle Times.
Passage of the initiative, which Bellevue gun rights advocate Alan Gottlieb said is “overly restrictive by a long shot” (no pun intended), would embolden the gun prohibition lobby to spend millions of dollars in other states to buy elections. Big money people like Bloomberg, and apparently Seattle venture capitalist Nick Hanauer, evidently think the size of their bank accounts gives them some right to foist their principles on everyone else.
At least, that’s how some gun rights activists appear to be looking at it as they react to the initiative on the Seattle Times’ reader feedback page today. They are also venting on several popular Northwest gun rights forums including Wa-Guns, Northwest Firearms, Seattle Guns, Shooters Northwest and Hunting-Washington.
It remains to be seen whether these furious gun owners can put together a counter effort and attract contributions from out-of-state gun owners who see an advantage to stopping this kind of thing in Washington before it reaches out to envelope their own state.
The Times story quoted the MAIG executive director, who “came to Seattle for the initiative’s kickoff and said afterward the group would support the ballot measure as much as possible.” That means money, lots of it, and the initiative is already taking on the appearance of an effort pushed by a bunch of elitist fat cats.
Do the math. According to the Times, last month’s kickoff fund raiser was attended by 1,200 people and it took in “just more than $1 million, according to initiative spokesman Christian Sinderman.” That averages just over $833 apiece, but that’s not really how it shakes down. In reality, the money included some very large contributions and a lot of smaller ones.
The initiative, still without a number at this writing, has some problems, according to Gottlieb – chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms – and others who are currently analyzing it. Veteran lobbyist and gun law expert Joe Waldron, who now serves asCCRKBA’s legislative director, has already spotted conflicts between the language and federal law on use of the National Instant Check System (NICS) and on the “delay” period between the time a dealer initiates a background check and the time he can complete the transaction, from the current 72 hours established in federal law to ten business days (translation: 14 days).
“Why,” Waldron asks rhetorically. “Isn’t the federal standard good enough?”
Waldron reminded this column of a famous statement made by the Rev. Martin Luther King, the great civil rights leader: “A right delayed is a right denied.” Dr. King was discussing voting rights, but a civil right is a civil right.
Except, perhaps, in the eyes of Seattle-centric gun control proponents.
http://www.examiner.com/article/why-washington-gun-control-initiative-will-get-national-attention
Screw ’em. The American people have made it perfectly clear how they feel about gun control, and all of Bloomberg’s money, or any ad campaign isn’t going to change that.
“It remains to be seen whether these furious gun owners can put together a counter effort and attract contributions from out-of-state gun owners..”
Furious gun owners shouldn’t give ’em a dime. They should be spending that money on more ammo. Everyone’s tired of their endless infringements and political wrangling, and we don’t need to bring the war to their arena.
“Shall not be infringed” is something they’re going to have to understand the hard way, because we’ve already tried every other way of explaining it to them. No one listens to them anymore anyway, so let ’em pass all the stupid laws they want to.