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Non-Tech : LOCK (Saf-T-Lok) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Magic RN who wrote (965)	5/20/1999 8:55:00 PM
From: $Mogul	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1039

LOCK should explode, with a full CBS slot for gun locks, with the CEO on, oh my, those shorts better run. The short squeeze should be pretty good!! $mogul

To: Magic RN who wrote (965)	5/20/1999 10:02:00 PM
From: Nietzsche	Respond to of 1039

With Dan Rather.

To: Magic RN who wrote (965)	5/20/1999 10:47:00 PM
From: DEER HUNTER	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1039

Thursday May 20, 10:25 pm Eastern Time Senate passes youth crime bill with gun measures (Recasts with final passage of bill) By Joanne Kenen WASHINGTON, May 20 (Reuters) - After Vice President Al Gore cast a tie-breaking vote on a watershed gun control amendment, the Senate on Thursday passed a sweeping juvenile-crime bill that included the first new firearms measures since the Republicans won control of Congress in the 1994 elections. The 73-25 vote came exactly one month after two teen-agers committed mass murder at their Colorado high school and just hours after a high school sophomore in an Atlanta suburb opened fire and injured six of his schoolmates. Gore broke the tie on a proposal by New Jersey Democrat Frank Lautenberg to require background checks on all transactions at gun shows. Just a week ago, Senate Republicans narrowly defeated a similar Lautenberg gun show amendment. In the shadow of the Littleton, Colorado, school rampage, Republicans flipped and flopped all week on guns. On gun show checks alone, they rejected them, accepted them, denied they had created loopholes and then backed Oregon Republican Gordon Smith's amendment to plug two holes they had argued did not exist. Ultimately, it was a change of heart by Georgia Democrat Max Cleland that made the difference. He voted against Lautenberg last week but cast the tying 50th vote on gun shows Thursday, paving the way for Gore to cast the winning 51st. Cleland decided on his position on Wednesday night, but news of the Atlanta shootings, near where he grew up, made him certain. ''I was ready to go last night, and like I said, coming down the ramp today, getting ready to cast the vote aye, in the middle of the Senate, in my mind's eye, I thought: This is a rare moment here. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am doing the right thing at the right time for the right reason,'' Cleland later told reporters. The bill, sponsored by Utah Republican Orrin Hatch, would dedicate $1 billion annually for five years to cracking down on violent young criminals and gang members while expanding delinquency-prevention programs. Hatch said his bill ''will help our young people do something significant about the problems of juvenile crime.'' But he added that if anyone focused solely on the gun aspects, ''they missed the boat.'' Hatch had drafted the bill long before the 15 deaths at Columbine High School in Littleton. But the shootings shocked Americans, colored the eight days of debate and transformed the legislation. The final Senate bill included the Lautenberg plan to require background checks on all gun show transactions. Such checks are already required for all sales by professional licensed dealers at shows or stores. It also makes it harder for minors to get semiautomatic assault weapons, bans the import of high-capacity ammunition clips, requires child safety locks to be sold with all handguns and authorizes a study of gun marketing. Though most of the gun steps were relatively modest and focused on youth, gun control advocates said they constituted a setback for the powerful National Rifle Association. Most of the measures had previously been defeated. ''It's been five long years since the Senate has passed an important measure to keep guns away from kids and criminals. For five long years, the NRA has dominated every vote,'' said Naomi Paiss of Handgun Control Inc. Republicans said existing gun laws had to be enforced rather than new ones enacted, and they repeated their view that violent movies and video games were more to blame for youth violence than easy access to firearms. Democrats did support some Republican amendments addressing such cultural factors as slasher movies and gory video games, but the Democrats pushed the gun issue persistently and adroitly, winning some swift victories and embarrassing the Republicans into reversing themselves. The NRA called the bill a ''charade of law-making'' and attacked the Clinton administration's record on enforcement. ''Everybody here knows and everybody listening to my voice knows that there have been people who have voted with the NRA for years who knew in their hearts that it was the wrong vote,'' Gore said after the tie-breaker. ''The real significance of this victory today is that by the narrowest of margins -- and that's often how change begins -- enough found the courage to change their minds,'' added Gore, who interrupted a 29th wedding anniversary getaway with his wife, Tipper, to be on hand if his vote was needed. It is too soon to know how similar legislation will fare in the House. Speaker Dennis Hastert has backed some action on guns, and a House panel may take that up in early June. But some Democrats are clamoring for more immediate action. Smith's loophole-closing gun-show amendment went far enough to satisfy some Republican moderates considering defecting to the Democrats. It did not sway the six Republicans who crossed party lines last week and did so again on Thursday. They were Mike DeWine and George Voinovich of Ohio, Peter Fitzgerald of Illinois, John Warner of Virginia, John Chafee of Rhode Island, and Richard Lugar of Indiana. The change in outcome came from the Democratic side. Last week two Democrats -- Cleland and Max Baucus of Montana -- voted against the bill, but Lautenberg's modifications won over Cleland. Two Democrats who were absent last week voted yes on Thursday. Lautenberg, who is retiring from the Senate after this term, was clearly savoring victory. ''This is kind of a big moment for me,'' he told reporters. ''I guess what we prove is that lame ducks can fly.''