Sound Of Silence

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roy reali

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We have had this administration for just over a year. Congress is under control of a certain political party. They are doing things that I feel are not good for the country, but those are topics that don't belong here. Topics about gun laws do. That is the point I am making here.

I have not heard much coming out of Washington in regards to gun laws or restrictions. There are some court cases dealing with this, but nothing from Congress or the President.

You would think I should be happy. Well, in a way I am. I feel that there already too many gun laws. In a way I am nervous. With the folks in charge, I wonder if they are concocting legislation aimed at gun owners. Some of the the other things they are doing seem to be pretty left-winged if not socialistic. Gun control falls in that area of political thinking.

Am I being overly sensitive to this? Should I be happy that the powers that be haven't decided to further infringe on my second amendment rights? Or am I justified in being nervous?

What are your feeling about this silence about gun laws?
 
The o-dministration is already well into gun control via back door non-bill restrictions. Last year they officially stopped funding all studies that may show positive benefits of gun ownership / CC. They did that so that no one could question that gun ownership was "bad". Much like we all "know" that being overweight is bad. Even though you will live 5 years longer if you are 10lb over ideal weight vs 10 lb under:rolleyes:.

The socialized health bill of Sunday and the ones to follow, will be placing restrictions on activities that are injurious to health and thus making the people who choose those activites expensive to insure . Being fat, eating salted food, driving a pickup tuck, smoking, chaw, owning a gun. Yes, you should expect that people that "Choose to engage in high risk behaviors will pay more". I think Mr O said that, could have been one of his buddies. So they won't directly attack gun ownership, but they will force you to buy health insurance and if you own a gun it will cost 5-10x more. Nice trick to force you to 'willingly' get rid of your guns.
 
Quite simply, gun control, at least at the federal level, has been a losing issue for 15-16 years. The Democrats lost control of Congress in '94 due in no small part to the passage of the Assault Weapons Ban of the same year. Likewise, Al Gore lost the presidency partly because of his stance on gun control (such was even admitted by Bill Clinton). The expiration of the AWB and passage of laws like the Lawful Commerce in Arms Act as well as growth in concealed carry and castle doctrine at the state level confirms this. Also, court rulings such as Heller v. D.C. and, in all probability, McDonald v. Chicago show that the Supreme Court is willing to strike down certain gun laws.

One must remember that in spite of the politics of it's leaders (namely Obama and Pelosi), the political leanings of many Democratic politicians isn't as far left as you might think. The Democratic takeover of Congress in '06 was accomplished mainly through replacing moderate or liberal Republicans with moderate or conservative Democrats from midwestern, southern, and western districts. Evidence of this can be seen through the great difficulty Obama and the Democrat leadership seems to be having pushing their agenda through in spite of having control of two out of three branches of the government. The areas that many of our senators and representatives come from are typically center-right politically and thusly wouldn't be very likely to support new gun control laws.

Make no mistake, we'll still hear the same old screaming and hand-wringing from the usual suspects (Fienstein, Schumer, Boxer, McCarthy, etc.) but the rest of the Democratic party just doesn't seem to be all that willing to fall on the political sword for them. While I don't think we should be resting on our laurels, I don't think we need to be losing sleep yet either.
 
Suicide

I agree that being too willing and vocal on gun control is not the brightest political move. Taking over one-sixth of the nations economy isn't either. Passing bills that the majority of Americans don't want isn't too smart. Apparently, some of these folks are willing to do anything to further their political agenda, even at the cost of their careers.

I almost wish that there was more vocalization of gun control coming out of Washington. I just have a sinking feeling something bad is going to come our way in regards to gun control.
 
I just have a sinking feeling something bad is going to come our way in regards to gun control.
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My suggestion is to help your regional office of your local party of choice, as the elections near and the candidate choices become clearer. Gun Control has always felt like it was out of my hands, but attempting to get people into DC and elected locally that support my beliefs is not. I happy with my new governor and also my new attorney general and I worked hard to support them during the elections.

Need some new DC representation for Virginia however, and I'm anxious for August and September to get started. I'm one of the idiots that puts out signs.:D

Anyway, it helps to remove that "sinking feeling", knowing folks are working for you and not against you.
 
I've been watching the gun control thing unfold since the mid 50s. My 2nd Amendment rights are the most important thing to me. I could care less that the pro-gun candidate is a fire breathing pro-life preacher or a lesbian Wiccan. The pro-gunner will get my vote every time.

Guns owners are in good shape politically because public opinion toward guns has changed drastically since the AWB and Brady passed in 1994. WebleyMKV summed it up pretty well. Do not assume that because a person has a D after his name that he/she is an anti. Likewise, do not assume that all the folks who have an R after their names are with us on gun control.

In 1994 the AWB passed the US house by one vote. The AWB was put over the top when the minority leader of the US house voted for the AWB. 76 majority party members of the US house voted against the AWB and 38 minority party members voted in favor of the AWB.

In 2004 the US house did not take up extension of the AWB. In 2004 the US senate voted to extend the AWB by a vote of 52-47. 10 (R) senators voted to extend the AWB.

An AWB would pass the present US senate with the help of about six minority party senators. No gun control is going to pass the US house anytime soon. Last fall 65 majority party members of the US house wrote letters to the white house telling them to lay off gun control.


http://www.sddt.com/News/article.cfm?SourceCode=20040302ff

Ten Republicans broke party ranks on the assault weapons vote: Warner, Chafee, Fitzgerald, DeWine, Lugar, Voinovich, Susan Collins of Maine, Judd Gregg of New Hampshire, Gordon Smith of Oregon and Olympia Snowe of Maine.

Six Democrats voted against extending the ban: Baucus, Nelson, Russ Feingold of Wisconsin, Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Zell Miller of Georgia and Harry Reid of Nevada.
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I don't trust this administration (or any when you get down to it) but at this point I'm not overly concerned that they are working on a backdoor gun ban policy.

Furthermore, with the recent "wins" in various court battles, I don't think that the current political enviroment is condusive to gun bans and/or restrictions. As someone above pointed out, a lot of the Dems are pro guns and the antis are in the minority.

Should we rest? No. The person who scares me more than any one is Bloomberg and there is rumour of his impending presidental run. With his fortune, I'm sure he can buy his way into office.
 
Everytime I read something like this, I stand a little further to the left. I don't lean left, I've very upright. Getting to be downright socialist, perhaps. But anyhow, if the far left (you know, the extremists) is so good at gun control, how come everyone has so many more guns than people did in the 1950s? Sometimes I get a little confused about cause and effect and maybe others do, too.

Not worried too much about terrorists with guns. Airplanes, yes. Trucks loaded with fertilizer or worse, yes. Not so much guns. Students with guns, yes, however.
 
The socialized health bill of Sunday and the ones to follow, will be placing restrictions on activities that are injurious to health and thus making the people who choose those activites expensive to insure . Being fat, eating salted food, driving a pickup tuck, smoking, chaw, owning a gun.
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Excuse me, but you're making things up out of thin air. There is absolutely nothing to support your claim here. It's nonsense.
 
You know... I'm gonna throw a few cents into the rings, here.

It's not about "us vs. them" on a bipartisan level, it's "us vs. them" on a pro-gun advocate vs. anti-gun advocate level. Whether you're a democrat or a republican, to me, should mean nothing more than what letter is next to your name. Unfortunately, people get blinded by this fact.

The truth is: there are a lot more conservative liberals and liberal conservatives than people think, and in that fact: we don't have to resort to discussing this in a political manner that is bound to get this closed.

We really should discuss this in a manner more befitting gun rights advocacy and not just a pro right-wing manner.

My advice to anyone worried about the "silence out of Washington" is this: there is no silence. It's screaming right now. Chicago vs. McDonald? That's high profile, it's in the SCOTUS, that's not silence. The current administration, as well, is so lambasted by so many people that they wouldn't dare take any action at this point to harm their already tarnished (in the eyes of some) reputation. Plus, before they can even do anything regarding firearms legislation, Chicago v. McDonald needs to be settled. Imagine the egg on their faces if they passed some kind of ridiculous legislation that gets turned over a month later by the SCOTUS.

A lot of politicians do things to hold onto their office and get votes, which is why the most important thing that we can do is to make our voices heard. Not by taking sides according to some imaginary line that was drawn 250 years ago that switched sides and changed over time. How we make our voices heard as advocates of gun owner rights is this: we write out congressmen, we write our senators, we write our councilmen, mayors, governors. We vote "pro-gun" not "anti-democrat," you know what I mean?
 
"To get a magor gun control bill passed at this time would mean doing it with shock value. Some kind of big catastrophe with many deaths..."

You mean like the massive gun control bill that was enacted after the Virginia Tech massacre?

Right. :rolleyes:
 
It's not about "us vs. them" on a bipartisan level, it's "us vs. them" on a pro-gun advocate vs. anti-gun advocate level. Whether you're a democrat or a republican, to me, should mean nothing more than what letter is next to your name. Unfortunately, people get blinded by this fact.
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+1

Too many gun owning folks who claim to be staunch supporters of the Second Amendment get wrapped around the axles by extraneous feel good stuff being spewed out daily on the radio by four or five far out political shills.
 
My suggestion is to help your regional office of your local party of choice, as the elections near and the candidate choices become clearer.
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Exactly right. Gun control on the federal level is political kryptonite, but there's still a fight at the local level in many places.

Following incorporation in June, we'll see the brushfires starting in places like Chicago, Baltimore and the District of Columbia. That's where our energy is needed.

Chances are, no matter where you live, there's some sort of goofy gun law on the books that could stand repealing. There are still hearts and minds to change.

I'll take back Tip O'Neill's quote from Speaker Pelosi: "All gun politics is now local."
 
Exactly right. Gun control on the federal level is political kryptonite, but there's still a fight at the local level in many places.
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I tend to disagree. The recent so called health care reform law shows that the current democratic controlled government is willing to force the views of a select few democratic leaders on the American people. The majority of congress and the majority of Americans didn't want this law to happen, yet it did.

These victories by Obama, Pelosi and Reid may be enough to make them think they can take on new gun bans. Never say never.
 
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You know, HKMP5SD, I should point out that the perception that the American Public is against the Health Care Reform Bill was gotten using illy worded surveys. When asked point by point, most people were, in effect, in support of the bill, but when asked about a nationalized, socialized or universal health care system, people would generally dislike it, because the name implied something far more sinister than what it was.

They do this for gun control, as well. How many poorly worded and shamefully written surveys, essays, investigations, reports and propaganda have you seen? Also, the entire point of the senate, congress, SCOTUS and executive branch is to provide the legislation, rulings, etc. etc. to the majority of the people, that's kind of the way that a democracy and republic work. Sometimes it doesn't agree with staunch lines that run between "Democrat" and "Republican." Sometimes, it does.

My point is: concerning gun control, you have to think outside of the predefined conceptions of right vs. left. I don't believe that gun ownership is either a left or right wing issue. I think it's an issue of the people, all people, in the United States. There are some people who oppose it, and there are some people who love it. And you know for a fact that you've seen egregious lies from both sides of the fence. So, instead of worrying about "what the democrats are going to do," worry about what YOU'RE going to do. Write letters, call senators, protest, sign petitions, be active in the sphere of politics. That's what I do. I've written several letters regarding my belief in the Illinois Concealed Carry Permit bill that's being worked on right now to several Illinois State Senators to let them know that there are people that want this. And if enough of us (the gun owning community) have agency regarding this topic, rather than passive complaining like "he's not my president" and "I hate democrats," then we can make things move.

I even wrote a letter to Pat Quinn (the incumbent) letting him know that I will not be casting my vote for him due to his rather lethargic stance regarding gun control and how he is doing nothing to better the ability of Illinois state citizens to protect themselves. I got a generic thank you letter back. This is the kind of action that WE as a community must take if we're to do anything. Sitting in our homes shaking in our boots like it's the Cold War again does nothing: be pro-active in your government. Visit town-hall meetings, write people. I can't stress this enough, that is what we must do.

Also, be proactive in your community and your social life. If you know people who know diddly-squat about guns who are talking about how gun control needs to be ramped up to get rid of assault weapons, ask them "how would that help?" or "How would restricting law abiding citizens from purchasing certain guns prevent criminals from obtaining them?" or inform them. My opinion is that the biggest opponent to Gun Owners Rights isn't "Gun Grabbers" or "The Democrats" or "The Left Wing," it's the campaign of misinformation that people have been exposed to. Why am I afraid of people knowing I own guns?! Because misinformation campaigns have turned people against me because I own guns. I said "no more!" and I started spreading the knowledge to anyone who would listen.

I'm sorry for rambling. But this is how I feel regarding gun control. Don't make it a bipartisan issue, make it an issue of the people, write letters, get our voices heard.
 
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