New HR 1022 Assault Weapons Ban - threads merged

Six more co-sponsors signed on as of March 9, 2007 (click on link for contact info):

Rep Capps, Lois [CA-23] - Democrat
Rep Clay, Wm. Lacy [MO-1] - Democrat
Rep Eshoo, Anna G. [CA-14] - Democrat
Rep Grijalva, Raul M. [AZ-7] - Democrat
Rep Miller, Brad [NC-13] - Democrat
Rep Wexler, Robert [FL-19] - Democrat

This brings the total number of co-sponsors to 18. Jackson-Lee and Wexler are also on the House Judiciary Committee that will hear this bill if it moves forward. So far, there is still nothing on the schedule; but they also haven't even started to post next week's schedule yet.
 
They need 20 committee votes and they need hearings and a vote to be scheduled. They already have about 17 by my count (14 who co-sponsored this bill previously and another 3 who supported various other AWBs).

A co-sponsor is just another Representative adding their support to the bill and means pretty much nothing until you have enough of them that you can use it as leverage. Bills get 100+ co-sponsors and go nowhere or get less than 30 and become law.

This bill has never gotten more than 111 co-sponsors in the past, so if it gets more than that, I'd start to worry.

Right now, the major factor in what happens with this bill is the Democratic House Leadership and Chairman of the House Judiciary (John Conyers). If either of them give their blessing to this bill, it is coming out of Committee. I think the main thing holding them up right now is that:

A) They are busy holding hearings in the hopes they will discover something that will allow them to impeach Bush.

B) They are scared of gun owners power at the polls and aren't ready to test it yet.
 
jimpeel offered the following, including the linked commentary, which is very much worth reading and thinking on.

I wrote this over seven years ago. I still believe it today.

http://www.thefiringline.com/forums/...74&postcount=6

In the absence of unity of our forces the Carolyn McCarthy's will prevail.

------------------

The correctness of his closing observation seems to obvious to warrant repeating.

Have you been in touch with your elected things recently?
 
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Bartholomew Roberts writes:
They need 20 committee votes and they need hearings and a vote to be scheduled. They already have about 17 by my count (14 who co-sponsored this bill previously and another 3 who supported various other AWBs).

A co-sponsor is just another Representative adding their support to the bill and means pretty much nothing until you have enough of them that you can use it as leverage. Bills get 100+ co-sponsors and go nowhere or get less than 30 and become law.

This bill has never gotten more than 111 co-sponsors in the past, so if it gets more than that, I'd start to worry.

Right now, the major factor in what happens with this bill is the Democratic House Leadership and Chairman of the House Judiciary (John Conyers). If either of them give their blessing to this bill, it is coming out of Committee. I think the main thing holding them up right now is that:

A) They are busy holding hearings in the hopes they will discover something that will allow them to impeach Bush.

B) They are scared of gun owners power at the polls and aren't ready to test it yet.
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Good posting! But maybe instead of being, "scared of gun owners power..." they will give their blessing. By the time the current, "grabbers", are up for re-election, many people will have forgotten that they now have fewer rights than before. Perhaps that is the reason the current legislators did not waste any time getting this garbage started. Unfortunately, people forget too soon.
 
Hopefully the Democrats will get stupid make it an issue. The original AWB voting in 1994 was razor thin when it came to a majority and cost the Democratic House speaker his job and the loss of the House and Senate to the Republicans.. If they do get stupid and get it some serious attention you can bet they will get the wrath of Hillary. There is no way she wants this as an issue in the 2008 Presidential election. After the election maybe...before..no
 
If this happens what will you do? Isn't it our constituional (?) right to bear arms to overthrow a corrupt government? Taking our rights away as citizens sounds pretty corrupt to me. How far would you go?
 
Tired from the battle but not giving up

Jim, it wasn't the big-gun organizations who stopped the Klintons and their minions the million morons, it was people like you and me. Ed Williamson in Knoxville, single-handedly started a fire when he protested the gun "buy-back" program by himself. They violated every right he had but he didn't back off.The next time 40 people (including myself and my wife) showed up to help Ed. Grass roots NC was formed and we joined in at least twice protesting at the million morons events here in NC. In both cases we were a diverse group, belonging to several of the big organizations. The press, when they bothered to try and get our views we're shocked that we weren't sent by a big organization, that we just came to protest. We also spent a lot of time on the phone calling/writing our legiscritters and visiting them when they were back home. Well placed letters to the editor were part of the strategy as well. The other side cannot be stopped but they can be beaten. At this point in the game it is best to keep the powder dry until we know the target, but I have no doubt we will all need to get busy. TRT if you're still here we may need to re-activate! The one thing I do note is that TFL now has over 40,000 members which is twice what we had back in the day. That's 20,000 more freedom loving gun owner brothers and sisters to help in the fight. I have been absent from the board too long but the sumabich@tfl is back:eek:
 
sumabich

... it wasn't the big-gun organizations who stopped the Klintons and their minions the million morons, it was people like you and me.
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But it is the big anti-firearms organizations which are getting these laws and regulations passed; because they know how to use their big organizations effectively and they all have but a single goal.

We, and our big organizations stand fractured because we have so many different venues in the shooting sports.

- The cowboy shooters don't think the government will come for their lever action, Colt single action, and side-by-side coachgun so screw the "assault weapon" afficionados. "Wanna see mah fast draw?"

- The skeet and trap shooters don't think the government will come for their pump, side-by-side, semi auto, or over and under shotguns so screw the "assault weapon" afficionados. "Pull!"

- The game hunters don't think the government will come for their bolt action, lever action, or slide action .30-30 hunting rifle so screw the "assault weapon" afficionados. "Shh, I think I heard a buck snort!"

- The birdmen don't think the government will come for their pump, side-by-side, semi auto, or over and under shotguns so screw the "assault weapon" afficionados. "Look! There's a duck!

You are correct that there is power in the grassroots and even the NRA has a grassroots division. The fact is that we, as individuals, do not have the monetary power of the collective organizations to fight these laws and regulations. The fact that they cannot come together for our collective good makes them nearly useless because of their "differences"; just like those listed above.
 
Reference is made to Jim Peel and his post # 91.

In passing, I continue to wonder as to exactly how the various groups that Jim mentions could have survived, in this dangerous world of ours, into adulthood, what with sharp knives and electric power in those commonly encountered "light sockets", while being so damned dumb as to spout what Jim mentions. By the way, I've heard some of this rubbish myself. Its amazing is about all that one can say, unless a realist might lean toward disgusting. The anti gunners are plainly out to kill gun ownership. Looking at the genesis of things, is that really so arcane, so abstruse, so difficult a concept to grasp? How it is that some amongst the gun owning segment of the population, a not inconsiderable segment of the population, seemingly fail to realize the obvious.

Getting on to other aspects of things, we come to last weeks DC Court of Appeals ruling in Parker. The court ruled that the DC laws did not pass constitutional muster, and they said that in pretty plain language. Fair, enough, which leads to the following. This year, like in most years, there are gun control proposals in the hopper. Are they significantly different from those found unconstitutional by the DC Appeals Court? In that they also attack the rights and privileges of the law abiding, while failing to impact, in any way at all, on criminals, the answer is NO.

Given this, don't or shouldn't gun owners see the relationship that exists amongst these various pieces of legislative garbage, the liklehood of their failing to pass constitutional muster, and isn't that point worth communicating to your elected things? I would think it was, but that's simply my opinion. Of course, so far as I've been able to determine, 2 + 2 still equal 4. It still does doesn't it?
 
Just got my first response today

My Congressman is CLUELESS!! (New York, of course). Feel free to borrow my letter as a reponse to any clueless politicians who are in favor of HR 1022

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Write2JoeCrowley [mailto:write2joecrowley@mail.house.gov]Sent: Tuesday, March 13, 2007 3:42 PM
To: XXX
Subject: Message from Congressman Crowley

Thank you so much for contacting me regarding your opposition to a ban on assault weapons. I appreciate hearing from you on this important issue but must respectfully disagree with you.

The Assault Weapons Ban and Law Enforcement Protection Act (H.R. 1022) would amend Federal firearm provisions to revise the definition of "semiautomatic assault weapon" (SAW). The definition would be expanded to include conversion kits (for converting a firearm to a SAW) and any semiautomatic rifle or pistol that has an ability to accept a detachable magazine and other specific characteristics, including: a folding or telescoping stock, a threaded barrel, or pistol grip.


This Act would also reinstate the ban on assault weapons and large capacity ammunition feeding devices (LCAFDs) for another ten years. As you may know, the ban on assault weapons expired on September 13, 2004. This bill would reinstate these repealed provisions.

Currently, this legislation has been referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary for further review and possible hearings. While I am not a member of the Committee, I will continue to monitor this bill closely.

Approved in 1994, the Federal assault weapons ban prohibits the manufacture and distribution of specific models of military-style assault weapons. Since 1994, in my view, many gun manufacturers have ignored the law, exploiting several loopholes by making small modifications to banned guns while retaining the key military features that defined those guns as assault weapons. As a result of this unscrupulous behavior of some gun manufacturers, the military-style assault weapons have continued to make their way into our neighborhoods, threatening the safety and security of our communities and our law enforcement personnel.

Again, thank you for your message. While we are in disagreement on this issue, I hope that you well respect my opinion as I respect your opinion. Please feel free to contact me again on this, or any other issue of importance to you.
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So I wrote back:



Dear Congressman Crowley,

Can you please provide me with the studies that support your view on a ban on these types of weapons? I.E. since the ban sunset in 2004, how many crimes have specifically been committed with firearms that would be banned under this new Act? How many crimes were committed during the original ban with firearms that would be banned under this Act?

Also, can you please name for me the manufacturers that you believe have acted in an "unscrupulous" manner? As far as I have been able to find, some companies that offered for sale such firearms that "exploited" the loopholes were companies such as Colt, Armalite, and Knight's Armament. These companies all have contracts with several, if not all, of the different Branches of the United States Military, both currently and for many decades in the past. They are the companies that are supplying our sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, fathers, grandfathers, husbands, wives, fellow Americans, etc etc etc with arms in our overseas & domestic War Against Terror. They are also the very same companies supplying arms to our law enforcement agencies, the ones you state that this ban is designed to protect.

These companies should be praised for a job so well done such as arming our troops and our law enforcement officers; calling them "unscrupulous", in my humble opinion, is completely beneath a man of your position and office.

Congressman Crowley, I write this with all due respect: Based on your statements below, I do not believe that you are very well informed on this issue, nor do you seem to be very familiar with firearms in general. Important decisions that you are faced with making, as my representative, should be based on complete familiarity and knowledge of the issue at hand, or at the very least with as much knowledge on the matter as you can possibly gather.

I am a member of the NRA, and as such can suggest various venues through which you could speak to experts on firearm designs and functions. Through such discussions, you would learn that many of the features that this ban lists would affect millions of sporting arms as well as the intended "military" type arms. This is nothing to say, of course, of the affront that such a ban is to the second amendment. I'm sure you are aware that the Circuit Court in D.C. just recently ruled that the second amendment is a right reversed by the people for defense, hunting and security of our free state, and is not a right reserved for the militia.

I also encourage you to speak to various hunting organizations and to learn of the immense benefits that hunting has on wildlife. The license fees and taxes on equipment are the main source of the millions, if not billions, of dollars that are used for conservation of one of our most precious renewable resources: our wildlife and the lands they inhabit. Bans such as this, although probably not intended to affect hunters, will indeed have an impact thru direct removal of our hunting tools. you may not believe this, but there are many states that permit hunting with "military" type weapons, and there is a huge following in that area that continues to grow every day.

I do not know if you are a hunter or not, but I'm certain that, as a hunter myself, I can also suggest various venues for you to contact that would be more than willing to discuss hunting and conservation issues with you.

Congressman Crowley, please consider my offers above to help you become more informed on these important issues. As my representative, I would hope that you would be willing to learn all you can before making a decision to cast your vote in either direction.

Thank you,
XXX
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jimpeel:

No way is the following a criticism of you, however when I downloaded http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9cDbA8O9-c, as mentioned in your post #97, thinking that I'd view/listen it, I got the following.

Given that that the soundtrack hardly runs for 6 or so words before coming to a crashing halt,rendering the thing virtually "unlistenable", I would hesitate sending it on to any elected person, with the suggestion that he or she view/listen to it before coming to any conclusions regarding so-called "assault rifles" and or proposals to ban or regulate the genre. The thing is that bad.

I do not know what the problem might be, for as I write this I'm listening to Mr. Pyle, and his voice does not seem to go on for 6 words without interruption. So far as I know, there is nothing wrong with my computer or Internet connection, both of which I use regularly.

I assume that others have been able to see/listen to this film, however I cannot, and I was certainly interested in sending it on to my "elected things". for their viewing. Having tried to listen to this, I would not so do.

Any suggestions that you or others might be able to offer, sort of shooting my computer, would be appreciated, regarding solving this problem. Thanks.
 
Alan, there is no problem with the video. It is localized to your system. Video/audio sync problems indicate CPU starvation on your system. check for rogue programs/spyware/etc.
 
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