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Posted: 7/19/2001 11:30:32 AM EDT
What a bunch of crap.  I hate to read this junk.  Ofcourse, it makes me want to work even harder at defending my RKBA.
------------------------------------

From an ATLANTA news org.
Constitution: U.S. gun stance endangers children
Staff
Thursday, July 19, 2001

In every contest pitting the safety of American children against the political power of the National Rifle Association, the kids lose. Now, the NRA can add the children of developing countries to its trophy case, as well.

[b]The NRA --- in the guise of the Bush State Department[/b] --- is blocking an effort by the United Nations to crack down on the 500 million small arms and light weapons that kill at least half a million people each year. [b]The White House maintains that keeping guns out of the hands of child soldiers in Sierra Leone will infringe on the rights of deer hunters here.[/b]

At least 300,000 children are fighting in foreign conflicts, many of them armed with American-made M-16s. In Africa, illegal guns fuel the 20 civil wars and armed conflicts now under way.

"The problem is so acute and urgent that any further waiting or delay will seriously undermine democracy," said Marsden Madoka, Kenya's presidential minister of state.

The United Nations proposes a nonbinding accord to cut down on the numbers of submachine guns, assault rifles, hand grenades, grenade launchers and portable missile launchers that are currently reaching crime syndicates, drug dealers and warlords. Since small arms trafficking transcends national borders, an international pact is essential. But it does not jeopardize the rights of private gun owners in this country in any way.

Nevertheless, the Bush administration announced its opposition before the U.N. conference on small arms began in earnest last week. "The United States will not join consensus on a final document that contains measures contrary to our constitutional right to keep and bear arms," said John Bolton, undersecretary of state for arms control and international security affairs.

The White House position further frays relations with our European allies.

"We should not allow ourselves to be blown off course by [b]unfounded fears [/b]spread by powerful lobbying organizations,'' said Ben Bradshaw, Britain's Foreign Office's undersecretary of state, in reference to the NRA.

As Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) pointed out earlier this week, the Bush administration's stance gives the world a distorted view of Americans' position on gun control. [b]Most Americans support more domestic gun control laws.[/b] She also noted that the United States ought to be leading the effort to curtail trafficking in small arms, not blocking it.

[b]In refusing to consent to the small arms ban, the White House is appeasing the camouflage and militia types who sleep with machine guns under their pillows and canned corn under their beds.[/b]

[b]Unfortunately, while their fears of black government helicopters are delusional,[/b] the carnage from guns in war-torn Third World countries is real.

[b]President Bush's opposition to a global ban on illicit gun sales will contribute to the massacre of thousands more women and children by illegally sold, U.S.-made guns. [/b]

[-!-]


Link Posted: 7/19/2001 12:23:12 PM EDT
[#1]
Please post link.

I wish to respond to these 'persons'.
Link Posted: 7/19/2001 12:24:47 PM EDT
[#2]
[url]http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/epaper/editions/today/opinion_b365488b01d6525d00ae.html[/url]
Link Posted: 7/19/2001 2:13:01 PM EDT
[#3]
I like how the byline is "Staff". Shows a major lack of guts on their part.

Furthermore, any news outlet that quotes Feinstein has no credibility in my book.
Link Posted: 7/19/2001 2:25:31 PM EDT
[#4]
Only 300,000 child soldiers in Africa?  That isnt a lot.

Of course they forget to point out that the alternatives to becoming a child soldier are either slow death by starvation or diesase in a UN death...I mean [i]refugee[/i] camp while being treated like cattle by the aid workers and still being subjected to rape robbery and murder.  Or being abducted- or sold by your own family- to slavers and be overworked and sexually abused untill you die.

In most of the wars through history [i]outside[/i] the United States the safest place to be in a war is in the ranks.  It is allways  the civilians, the non-combatants that suffer most, through starvation and disease mostly but also through murder in the act of comitting robbery or rape.  This is what "neutrality" and "pacificism" brings one.  

Given the anarchy in presant day Africa, they are probably the safest of all the children.
Link Posted: 7/19/2001 2:27:50 PM EDT
[#5]
Population control.  There are too many people in the world anyway.  Traffic sucks.
Link Posted: 7/19/2001 2:45:55 PM EDT
[#6]
What a bunch of Bu*& Sh@#.  This is a perfect example of how the media supports the anti rethoric. I bet that this organization would not print an essay one of us sensible gun owners authored.  Blaming the U.S. for the "war-torn third world countries" problems is like blaming a gun (an inanimate object) for a criminal shooting an innocent person.  It's not their fault they can't resolve their differences civilly, It's those gun loving crazies in the U.S., what a load of SH%$.  I think I will send a nice fat check to the NRA today to ease my mind>
Ed out.
Link Posted: 7/19/2001 4:03:52 PM EDT
[#7]
OK, here's what I sent them:
Ladies and Gentlemen of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

I would prefer to address this note to whomever actually wrote the opinion piece in Thursdays edition, but it is marked simply "Staff".  I doubt this means that the entire staff sat around and wrote the essay as a group effort.  More likely it means that you know how much protest you're going to receive over it, so the author prefers to remain anonymous to prevent a flood of direct mail.

I find it constantly amazing that the news media seems to know what is best for the public at large, but has such a poor track record at convincing them of it.  First it was "Saturday Night Specials", then "Cop Killer Bullets", then "Plastic Guns", then "Assault Weapons", then "Sniper Rifles", then "Pocket Rockets".  And none of that worked.  So now, it's no longer "gun control" you're touting, it's "gun safety".  It's "for the children".  And not just our own children, oh no!  Now it's the WORLD'S children.   Yes sir, every child who dies by gunfire anywhere in the world is the responsibility of the National Rifle Association - at least to hear you tell it.  It's never the fault of the person behind the trigger, or the government behind the person.

"The White House maintains that keeping the guns out of the hands of child soldiers in Sierra Leone will infringe on the rights of deer hunters here."  (Obeisance to the holy hunting rifle must be made by all gun-control proponents, as exampled here.)  On the contrary.  The position is that the ideas being pushed will affect law-abiding gun owners both here and abroad without having any effect on armed conflict in African nations or crime anywhere.  After all, the Hutu and Tutsi warriors had no problem killing each other with machetes when guns were not available, didn't they?  Shall we call for global sharp-object control?  Gun control has certainly worked wonders in England, hasn't it?  Didn't Dan Rather recently report that violent crime there is higher than in the U.S.?  Hasn't England suffered from a higher level of handgun involved violence AFTER they banned them all?

"At least 300,000 children are fighting in foreign conflicts, many of them armed with American-made M-16s."  And many, many more armed with Soviet and Chinese AK-47s, AK-74s, and SKS rifles, which are by far more numerous than the expensive and delicate M-16.  The guns are already out there in massive quantity.  Trying to stop the influx now is equivalent to closing the barn door after the horse escapes.  And about as useful as the "war on drugs" which has, after over 30 years, managed to put a million people in jail here, and resulted in LOWER street prices.
View Quote

Link Posted: 7/19/2001 4:05:50 PM EDT
[#8]
"Since small arms trafficking transcends national borders, an international pact is essential.  But it does not jeopardize the rights of private gun owners in this country in any way."  Oh?  The United Nations International Study on Firearm Regulation (available at [url]http://www.uncjin.org/stats/firearms/index.htm[/url]) states in its "Introduction and Methodology":  "The international project team established for the study determined at the outset that the research should: a) be descriptive and neutral; b) deal with only firearms, excluding landmines and other armaments; and c) focus solely on civilian regulations and civilian-owned firearms, excluding the military."

Civilian regulations and civilian-owned firearms, EXCLUDING the military.

The report generated by the data gathered under this study is "Criminal Justice Reform and Strenghtening of Legal Institutions, Measures to Regulate Firearms" available at [url]http://www.uncjin.org/Documents/6comm/4e.pdf[/url] .

Its conclusions?

(a)  Import and export controls on firearms are not sufficient by themselves to prevent ILLICIT TRAFFICKING IN FIREARMS (my emphasis.  That is, after all, what the conference was about, no?  Illicit trafficking?);

(b)  The absence of effective firearm regulation in one Member State (read:  the U.S.) can undermine not only the regulatory efforts but also the effective governance of Member States (while so far we've seen everything up to and including complete bans that, by all measures, aren't "effective regulation");

(c)  The manufacture and trade in firearms for CIVILIAN USE (my emphasis) require effective domestic regulation and international cooperation and control;

Later in the report the U.N. recommends:

The Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice should be invited to encourage Member States to consider, where they have not done so, regulatory approaches to the civilian use of firearms that include the following common elements:

(i)  Regulations relating to the safe use and storage of firearms (think England and Australia.  Unreasonable search, anyone?);

(ii)  Appropriate penalties for serious offences involving the misuse of firearms (THAT'S novel);

(iii)  Amnesty or similar programmes to encourage citizens to surrender illegal, unsafe or unnecessary firearms (and aren't they all unsafe and unnecessary according to Sara Brady and the UN?  Including the sacred deer hunter's long-range sniper rifle?);
View Quote

Link Posted: 7/19/2001 4:06:41 PM EDT
[#9]
(iv)  A LICENSING SYSTEM (my emphasis) to ensure that persons who are at high risk of misusing firearms are prevented from possessing and using firearms (and hasn't this worked wonders in England and Scotland?  Now that handguns are banned there, crimes involving handguns are at their highest levels in history!  Boy, didn't that work good?  Let's try it here!);

(v)  A record-keeping system for firearms, including a requirement for appropriate marking of firearms at manufacture and at import to assist criminal investigations, discourage theft and ENSURE THE ACCOUNTABILITY OF OWNERS (my emphasis).  (Sure, if someone steals your gun and uses it in a crime it should be YOUR FAULT.  Boy, that licensing system in Canada sure is coming along swimmingly isn't it?  And they have nowhere NEAR 240,000,000 firearms like we do here!)

Yes, indeed.  The American deer hunter has nothing to fear.  Nothing at all.  No sir.  Whatever gave us that idea?

And you quoted Dianne Feinstien.  Isn't she the one who said "Banning guns addresses a fundamental right of all Americans to feel safe." and "If I could have gotten 51 votes in the Senate of the United States for an out right ban, picking up every one of them... "Mr. and Mrs. America, turn 'em all in", I would have done it."?  Not exactly someone I want to trust on the subject of "reasonable gun control, if you don't mind.

You can write gun control propaganda pieces as long as you want.  You do, after all, have that right.  But don't expect us to buy it, and don't expect us to roll over and take it without comment.  Finally, we've had enough.  The NRA has over four million dues-paying members, and there are many other groups out there speaking the truth as well.  The Constitution guarantees to the people of the United States the right to keep and bear arms, and we're not willing to give it up for some apocryphal promise of "safety".  

And I will sign my name to this essay.  Respond if you wish.

Kevin Baker
Tucson, AZ
View Quote


I HATE the 3500 character limit.
Link Posted: 7/19/2001 4:22:14 PM EDT
[#10]
Kevin B.   Wow..... now that was a LETTER!!!! You go boy.  I got goosebumps.  Wish the news media would allow you to speak on behalf of gun owners instead of the "bubba hunter's" they always talk to for comment!


Thanks for writing that,
Steven L.
Link Posted: 7/19/2001 4:42:49 PM EDT
[#11]
One word... AMEN!

That said it all.  I sending money to NRA right this moment.
[sniper]
Link Posted: 7/19/2001 9:03:46 PM EDT
[#12]
Quoted:
Kevin B.   Wow..... now that was a LETTER!!!! You go boy.  I got goosebumps.  Wish the news media would allow you to speak on behalf of gun owners instead of the "bubba hunter's" they always talk to for comment!


Thanks for writing that,
Steven L.
View Quote


You're welcome.  I'm glad someone appreciated it, 'cause it'll never see print in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution you can bet.

And remember, the media MUST HAVE the "bubba hunters" - they continue the stereotype of ignorant, inbred idiots who blast street signs and small furry animals for entertainment.  There's little to no risk any intelligent member of our community will end up on even the local news unless they can work it to make us look bloodthirsty.

I write these idiots just to get it out of my system, but it generally just makes my blood pressure go up! (edited because "inbred isn't spelled "inbread".)
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