http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/ny-usweap083577062dec09,0,6493933.story?coll=ny-nationalnews-headlines

linky no worky but It might now.

Uphill Battle for Weapons Ban
McCarthy pressing to extend law

By Elaine S. Povich
WASHINGTON BUREAU

December 9, 2003

Washington - In the decade since the Long Island Rail Road shooting and the nine years since Congress enacted a law to ban assault-style semiautomatic weapons, the world has changed, according to Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-Mineola). And not for the better.

That's why she and other gun-law advocates are pressing to extend the assault weapons ban enacted in 1994, a year after the LIRR shootings that killed six and wounded 19. The ban will expire in September unless Congress and the president act.

McCarthy, whose husband, Dennis, was killed and son, Kevin, gravely wounded in the shootings, and other backers of the law are facing an uphill battle.

House Republican leaders say they won't bring it up this year. House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) does not have it "on the radar screen right now," said spokesman John Feehery. "We'll re-evaluate priorities for next session, but it's not on his priority list now."

President George W. Bush, who pledged in his campaign he would sign an extension of the weapons ban if it reached his desk, seems unenthusiastic about pressuring Congress to get it there. The president has "made it clear he supports the extension of the assault weapons ban," said White House spokeswoman Claire Buchan. But she listed Medicare and fighting the war on terror as the president's "highest priorities" and wouldn't say where the assault weapons ban ranked on that priority list.

To McCarthy, extending the assault weapons ban fits nicely into the war on terror. She cited both the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and last year's Washington-area sniper shootings as two reasons the ban needs to remain in effect.

"The world has changed since 10 years ago. It hasn't gotten any better," she said. "We talk about terrorists being in this country. Let's learn a lesson from what happened in D.C. when a lone sniper could take down a whole city. People were terrified."

John Muhammad has been convicted in one of the sniper shootings and his alleged accomplice, 18-year-old Lee Malvo, is currently on trial in another. The gun used in those attacks was a copycat of an AR-15 assault rifle banned under the 1994 law.

The National Rifle Association has campaigned hard to let the law expire, saying if any guns are banned then, eventually, more will be. In a letter to lawmakers, Chris W. Cox, executive director of the NRA's Institute for Legislative Action, suggested that those who support the ban "have a much broader agenda," which he said is to ban all guns.

Not so, said Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), the main Senate backer of the assault weapons ban reauthorization. He said he and other supporters decided not to expand the assault weapons ban as a way of simply getting the president to live up to his campaign promise to continue the ban. If the bill was expanded, it might give fuel to the fire of those who say the ultimate goal is to ban other weapons.

"We have only one hope here, to smoke the president out," Schumer told Newsday reporters last week. "The president said he was for it in the campaign and the vast majority of Americans, even gun owners, are for it. While people may not want to move forward on gun control, they don't want to move back."

Schumer and Americans for Gun Safety, a nonprofit group that advocates handgun restrictions, cite a poll by the firm Penn Schoen conducted in October that showed 77 percent of 802 polled favor reauthorizing the assault weapons ban. In gun-owning households, the number in favor of the law was 66 percent. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

But the proposal has large political implications for many senators and representatives. Even some Democrats are trying to steer clear of the issue heading into an election year, speculating that former Vice President Al Gore's support of gun laws contributed to his defeat in southern states. McCarthy and Schumer admit some members of their own party are skittish about supporting the assault weapons ban, but say there are enough Republicans supporting the ban to make up for them, at least in the Senate.

The whip count is very close, according to one advocacy group that has been meeting with senators while Congress has been on recess and there's no sure outcome.

McCarthy is undaunted. She came to Congress in 1996 after beating then-Rep. Dan Frisa (R-Westbury), who had voted to repeal the assault weapons ban.

"I knew I was in for a tough battle in the first place," said McCarthy last week, as she was heading out of her office to lay a wreath at the Merillon Avenue Station in Garden City, where the LIRR train stopped 10 years ago after passengers subdued gunman Colin Ferguson. "I'm just trying to make this country a little safer."

Copyright © 2003, Newsday, Inc. |  Article licensing and reprint options

And there you have the duck/deer hunters, trap/skeet shooters and "sportsmen".  The ones that mostly belong to the NRA and who don't have a fucking clue about what is going on (and many don't want to know).

[furious][pissed][X]

That bitch can pound sand.[50][pissed]

Airwolf-

Those were either John Kerry types or folks with air guns.

CRC

I wouldn't put that by the bastards at all.

AGS: "Do you own a gun?"

Polled Person:  "No, not really, just an Airsoft and a Red Rider BB gun I got for Christmas as a kid."

AGS: "That's good enough for us.  You're a 'gun owner' in our book"

[pissed]

Hmmm, alright, 77% of 802 people, huh?  Mmmmkay, right.  Now, let's see, where do we (Chuckie Schumer/AGS hat on) go to find those 802 people representative of the American public?  Why, any college campus, of course, where socialis, eh, democracy reigns supreme and the people are indoctrinated, um I mean, educated.  Banning assault weapons will prevent people from hijacking airplanes with fingernail clippers, and Muhammed and Malvo will be content to snipe with just slingshots.  

*Chuckie Schumer/AGS hat off*  yeah, sure, right, real accurate representation of the American people.  How about polling me, or any of my buddies at the range for a change?  

Ghost

it is done, the ban is to die, we will have prebans again

Zaphod (mentally) strokes his AR15 with an evil grin....

Come and take it, bitch!

- Z (Proud member of the 34%)

I tend to believe that.  Problem is... for how long will we have them?  Only until the next time someone decides they can get political mileage from pushing another ban through.

Even if it doesn't rear its head in Congress the states have shown a willingness to go that route.  Look at IL, they tried to ban damn near everything... and the proposal that just came up in OH.  The sunset wont do a damn thing for those of us here in the PRK (one of the reasons I plan to be a citizen of Free America by Sep 2004).

[/quote]Problem is... for how long will we have them?  Only until the next time someone decides they can get political mileage from pushing another ban through.[/quote]


I agree.  Sooner or later, the Demosocialists will get back in power and the first order of business will be a new AWB with the so-called "loopholes" closed, and no sunset provision this time around, either.  If this bad law goes away, stock up soon, because it will probably be back again, worse than ever.


Steve

I have 5 grand in the bank with the name[}:D] "evil features" [}:D]on it!!! its stock up time boys(and girls)!!! no seriously, i pray every night for the AWB to go into the history books and i hope everyone else does the same.

Work to prevent any ban, but stock up too for the worst...

Prior to the 9/11/01 WTC/Pentagon attack, people would say that is not a weapon because it was not originally designed for that purpose, i.e. airplanes, cars etc. The BS arguements about banning AW was also blown away on 9/11.