Citizens say "Yes!" to stricter gun laws
Charley: You're a sharp guy but you tend to post too much slanted stuff that plays free and easy with the truth. The Michelle Malkin piece you posted was fictional opinion ... more fantasy than truth, really.
So here's a dose of truth. Here's what happened in the state of Colorado on 11-7. Not even Moses and all his NRA bucks could put a dent in this vote.
Story appeared in the Denver Rocky Mountain News on Nov. 8:
Headline: VOTERS GO FOR CONTROL OF FIREARMS
Date: Wednesday, November 8, 2000
By Carla Crowder
RMN News Staff Writer
The gun-show loophole slammed shut as Colorado voters defied the state legislature and overwhelmingly passed a stricter gun-control law on their own.
Coloradans approved Amendment 22 with about 70 percent of the vote.
``What a sweet night and what a sweet victory,'' said Tom Mauser, of SAFE Colorado, which sponsored the initiative. Mauser fought all year for the law after his son Daniel was killed at Columbine.
``The NRA just simply couldn't badger, bully or buy the people of Colorado,'' he said Tuesday night to celebrating supporters at a Downtown Denver art gallery.
The success is a coup for SAFE Colorado, and a blow for the National Rifle Association and other gun groups who fought the measure, even convincing the Republican-led legislature to kill a similar bill.
SAFE's leaders, riding on their success, vow to keep a close eye on the Colorado legislature, and fight expected efforts to loosen concealed-weapon laws.
The group - which emphasizes bipartisan power - will be pushing a gun safe-storage law and a law raising the minimum age for handgun possession from 18 to 21.
``We will continue, we hope, as a major force in the state for responsible gun controls,'' said Democratic political consultant and SAFE co-founder Arnie Grossman.
``You cannot write off Colorado as a frontier state where no one can make any progress toward solving gun violence problems,'' he said.
As a fledgling gun-control group, SAFE vowed last year to battle the nation's biggest gun lobby by co-opting their pet tactics: grassroots organizing boosted by big-money advertising campaigns.
As the proposal sailed to success, the group reveled in deriding the gun lobby.
``Common sense and the common good won out over money and the intimidation of the National Rifle Association and the gun lobbies,'' said Republican lawyer and SAFE co-founder John Head.
The new law will change the nature of gun shows, the flea market-like events held nearly every weekend somewhere in Colorado.
Before, hobbyists, collectors or individuals trying to unload a collection that Grandpa left behind could rent a table and sell a gun to anyone. Now, private parties must pay a licensed dealer $10 to check the buyer's record through the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.
Before, merchants who knew the system drew shady gun buyers with a ``private sale'' sign on their tables, signaling no background check. Now, those wink-and-nod sales are illegal.
The ``loop hole'' aided the teen-aged Columbine killers in obtaining three of the four guns they used to kill 12 classmates and a teacher last year.
Colorado is ``home of a national tragedy, but the birthplace of a national solution,'' said Jonathan Cowans, president of Americans for Gun Safety, which spent $900,000 on the Colorado initiative.
Critics say the law unfairly targets gun shows, and leaves gaping holes for felons to buy guns. Private sales from homes and newspaper classified ads remain unregulated by background checks.
Oregon voters approved a similar law Tuesday.
``The only two places where guns were on the ballot were in Western states that are pro-gun, and this sends a very strong message to Congress,'' said Joe Sudbay, political director of Handgun Control Inc., a Washington-based anti-gun lobby that pumped $185,000 into the measure.
In Colorado, the fight is far from over.
Paul Grant, the Englewood attorney who lost a series of legal challenges to keep the initiative off the ballot, plans to keep up his courtroom battles. Grant believes all background checks are unconstitutional. ``SAFE's proposal is only a pimple.''
SAFE Colorado leaders braced for the NRA's millions, but they never came. The gun lobby by late October had tossed in $660,000.
``As important as the people from SAFE Colorado would like to think they are, their issues are, there are a lot of things the NRA and its members are interested in, said gun-rights attorney Hugo Teufel of Citizens for Responsible Lawmaking, which fought Amendment 22.
Congressional races, state legislature battles, and especially the presidency were more important, said Teufel. |
