Titled: Assembly Bills Target Gun Violence

New York gives notice that it intends to commit suicide deepen its problems in this article outlining new proposed gun ban control laws.

Cracking Down on Illegal Street Gun Trafficking
The bill, sponsored by Assemblywoman Amy Paulin (D-Scarsdale), requires stringent recordkeeping and reporting to prevent gun sales to criminals. Additionally, under terms of the legislation, gun dealers must implement a security plan, require employee training and prohibit minor's access to guns.

Besides the fact that selling guns to criminals is already a crime, records are already kept and the FBI is consulted on every dealer sale, this is just futher harassment of dealers and owners. I can't imagine a gun dealer that doesn't already have a security plan, training and access policies. 

Banning Armor Piercing Ammunition
This measure, sponsored by Assemblyman David Koon seeks to rid New York streets of deadly armor piercing ammunition and ammunition that is designed to fragment or explode upon impact.

Most rifle ammunition pierces the type of armor issued to the police. Fragmenting ammunition is a safety feature designed to avoid pass-through injuries to bystanders and explosive ammunition is already strictly regulated.

Tracking Guns Involved In Crimes
Another bill included in the package would require law enforcement personnel to submit ballistic information to the new State Police Ballistic Identification Databank whenever spent bullets, shell casings or guns come into their possession.

And what a success all the other databases have been! Even country wide systems like Canada has have been huge, expensive failures, reducing funding for more traditional and effective policing.

Keeping Guns Out of the Hands of Violent Felons
Another bill would eliminate a loophole that allows a convicted violent felon to obtain a firearms license and possess a gun after being granted a legal waiver.

This should be a question for the issuer of the waivers, who should set fair policy, not a blanket law that allows no exceptions.

The Children's Weapon Accident Prevention Act
This legislation, sponsored by Assemblyman Harvey Weisenberg (D-Long Beach), seeks to protect children from accidental shootings. Five new categories of crime would be created under the bill's provisions for negligent storage of a weapon.

Lock 'em up, unloaded, with the ammo stored elsewhere to avoid fines and jail time. Making self-defense weapons all but useless. Nothing like trying to unlock a gun, find the ammo, load and aim while someone is threatening you and your family.

Childproofing Firearms
This bill, sponsored by Assemblyman Steve Englebright (D-East Setauket), would seek to reduce child-related shootings, particularly those tragedies of children shooting children. This bill would make it a Class A misdemeanor to sell guns without childproof features. Covered under provisions of the bill are pistols or revolvers manufactured 12 or more months after the effective date of the bill. Design features could include making the weapon more difficult to fire by adjusting the trigger resistance of the gun to at least a 10-pound pull, altering the firing mechanism so that an average five-year-old child's hand would be too small to operate the gun or to require a series of multiple motions in order to fire the gun.

10 pound trigger pulls make for lousy handguns, increasing the risk of badly-aimed shooting. This law is aiming to make guns more expensive, more difficult to use under stress and is a roundabout way of forcing manufacturers to make firearms just for New York or lose the right to sell there. With over 200 million firearms in circulation already in the US this is just another step onto the slippery slope of a total national ban.

Stopping Assault Weapons
This legislation, sponsored by Assemblyman John Lavelle (D-Staten Island), would ban assault weapons. Seeking to address the void when President Bush and Congress allowed the federal assault weapon ban to expire, the Assembly proposal would expand the definition of assault weapon to prohibit more of these deadly guns in New York - including guns that have been modified to work like assault weapons.

Under the gun-grabbers definition of "assault weapons", this would cover just about any semi-automatic firearm.

Banning 50-Caliber Weapons
Another proposal, sponsored by Assemblywoman Patricia Eddington (D-Patchogue), would ban 50-caliber sniper weapons, which can be used to disable commercial aircraft and helicopters and are powerful enough to penetrate steel plating.

Another law attempting to follow The Peoples Republic of California. Our right is to have military grade weapons, not sporting arms. The 2nd is NOT about hunting. 

Domestic Violence
Sponsored by Assemblyman Daniel O'Donnell (D-Manhattan), this measure seeks to protect victims of domestic violence by requiring criminal or family court judges to inquire about the existence and location of firearms owned or possessed by a defendant when an order of protection is sought.

Pick a crazy partner who thinks a piece of paper is going to protect them and your rights are gone forever. Not only will the court take away these rights, it will now be forced in enquire about the locations of all weapons in your possession. 

 

Oh, how deluded these lawmakers prove themselves to be over and over again. I know I'm undoubtably preaching to the choir here, but laws do not affect criminals. That is why they are called criminals. Laws only affect victims, making more of them and making their right to a peaceful and safe life more difficult.

One argument is to allow the states to pass whatever they want and then see where the people move to as the cities decay into chaos. Unfortunately while we can use information to choose a place to live, once you are there, it is a significant burden to uproot and escape the madness. Once one state starts to impinge on our rights, the others often follow. 

Please do whatever you can to stop the madness now, before it is too late.

 

Titled:   Sen. Kennedy to Publish Children's Book

The rolling train wreck of comedy that is Swimmer Senator Kennedy continues his journey into the annals of comedic irony this week with the launch of his new childrens book "My Senator and Me: A Dogs-Eye View of Washington, D.C."

And what do we learn from Ol' Flipper this time? That he has a dog named "Splash".

This is the same Senator quoted in the aftemath of hurricane Katrina:

"What the American people have seen is this incredible disparity in which those people who had cars and money got out and those people who were impoverished died."

Does he actually know what he is doing?

 

Titled:   The End of Blogs?

Say Uncle reports on what may be the end of blogs as we know it. Aparently on January 5th 2006 H.R. 3402, the “Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act of 2005″ outlawed any anonymous comment on a blog that "annoys" another party.

According to CNET News.com:

Buried deep in the new law is Sec. 113, an innocuously titled bit called "Preventing Cyberstalking." It rewrites existing telephone harassment law to prohibit anyone from using the Internet "without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy."

Because the penalty is up to two years, that is enough to ensure you would lose your Second Ammendment rights too.

The word "annoys" is clearly a problem too, being so vague and not specifying even a reasonable level of actual harm and distress.

It looks as if the Right to not be Annoyed has trumped at least the First and Second Ammendments.

 

Titled:   No ID card? Hand over £2,500 then!

Samizdata highlights the slippery slope of liberty infringement in the UK. First there is floated the idea of a voluntary card for security purposes, with public consultation. Then despite an overwhelming outcry, the project gets moved ahead anyway, with assurances that no-one will be forced to have one. Then the cost comes in: about $150 per card. Which will now be required if you want Government "Services". Then local government is given sweeping new powers to heavily fine people if they don't have one when their homes are searched. Full story here.

 

Titled: N.Y. Times Editor-Reporter Dies After Attack in NW

It is often said a liberal is a conservative who hasn't been mugged yet. Often, this violent and unexpected shock is enough for people to open their minds a little and consider options previously considered out-of-bounds. In the above story, David E. Rosenbaum was killed and robbed near his home in Washington D.C., a city with a blanket gun ban in place, despite constitutional protections. And the local people's reaction?

"We have very small children. We'll have our guard up even more, use our alarms more religiously," Bass said.

Yup - that will do it. Just like those appalling ADT commercials on TV, where the guy in black breaks open the back door, the alarm sounds and the family huddles hopelessly together awaiting the call from the montoring center. "Are you OK? Help is on its way." I'd just like them to show what happens in the intervening 15 minutes. Or an alternative version, where the family replies "Yes we're fine, but we need someone to come take the body away."

So citizens of D.C., set your alarms. Especially the ones you use when walking around in that oh-so-safe city of yours?

 

Titled: Gun Control: The Promotion of Denial

Have you ever asked yourself: Why, when evidence overwhelmingly shows gun banners are wrong, do they persist in making outrageous claims about law-abiding gun owners? There may finally be an answer, so read on.

“Protecting your proverbial castle would not only include your home, but also your car and any place you are legally allowed to be. "It would decriminalize the use of deadly force or lethal force in self-protection circumstances," said Wayne Groth – a supporter of [Michigan] state House Bill 5142 and House Bill 5143.”

“There is no reason to pass a law that sends a signal to the most aggressive people in society that they can act more aggressively than they can now,” said Peter Hamm, Communications Director for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence

Michigan House Bill 5142 would allow the use of “deadly force” without first trying to retreat if a law-abiding gun owner is attacked in their home or on their surrounding land. House Bill 5143 goes further by stating that the defender does not have a duty to retreat and is also free from prosecution and civil action if their actions are found to be lawful. Such defense would be allowable in a “dwelling, residence, or occupied vehicle.” This bill also mentions conditions under which the use of deadly force is not acceptable. For instance, in the case of simple trespass, the defender may not use deadly force. Thus, the law-abiding gun owner or Right-to-Carry licensee is responsible to understand and follow the law or suffer terrible consequences, which is simply a continuation of current law.

As to Mr. Hamm’s implication that gun owners are “the most aggressive people in society,” we should at least try to determine if Michigan RTC licensees make the state more violent. After all, Oxford English Dictionary defines aggressive as: “ready or likely to attack or confront.” Therefore, there should be some statistical record to show that violent attacks or confrontations increased after Michigan enacted its RTC law in 2001. Instead, what we find is that from 2001 through 2004, Michigan’s homicide, robbery, and assault rates dropped more than the national average.

Michigan Vs. U.S. Violent Crime, 2001-2004
	Violence	Homicide	Rape	Robbery	Assault
Michigan	-10.0%	-4.5%	+2.8%	-13.6%	-13.1%
U.S.	-7.7%	-1.8%	+1.3%	-7.9%	-8.6%

Read the rest at the Chron Watch Blog

 

Titled:    Americans Okay With Current Balance Between National Security and Individual Liberty

Americans are generally comfortable with the current balance between national security concerns and individual liberties. Nearly a third of the respondents in a Rasmussen Reports survey (32%) say that our legal system worries too much about individual rights at the expense of national security. A similar number (29%) say there is too much concern for national security at the expense of individual liberties. Twenty-seven percent (27%) say that the current balance is about right.

So about a third are happy, and two thirds are unhappy. And this makes the current situation OK? I don't think that is what the results say. To me, it shows a broadly divided opinion, in which the views spread from the far laft to the far right, resulting in the mean and median being near the center. "Americans Broadly Divided Over Current Balance Between National Security and Individual Liberty" is nearer the mark. Mind, I'm not a polling expert like Rasmussen, so believe who you like, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express once.

Posted by Dave the hyphenated American


 

Titled: Your phone records are for sale

The Chicago Police Department is warning officers their cell phone records are available to anyone -- for a price. Dozens of online services are selling lists of cell phone calls, raising security concerns among law enforcement and privacy experts.

Criminals can use such records to expose a government informant who regularly calls a law enforcement official.

Suspicious spouses can see if their husband or wife is calling a certain someone a bit too often.

And employers can check whether a worker is regularly calling a psychologist -- or a competing company.

Some online services might be skirting the law to obtain these phone lists, according to Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), who has called for legislation to criminalize phone record theft and use.

Yea but Bush did it first!!!

 

You know you've hit the big time when your blog gets recognized in the "The Truth Laid Bear Ecosystem".

The Liberty1st blog has reached a ranking of #17880 making us a Multicellular Microorganism.

Thanks to all readers, linkers and commenters for helping us reach a level at which we can at least probably move, even if intelligent thought is a few steps away.

 

Titled: New Disclosure Rules Expose NEA's Millions to 'Left-Wing' Causes

A union watchdog group says a new disclosure report confirms that the nation's largest teachers union, the National Education Association (NEA), is heavily involved in the wider liberal political movement and the Democratic Party.

Earlier this week, the Wall Street Journal reported that the NEA gave $65 million last year to liberal groups such as People for the American Way, the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), and the Human Rights Campaign, which is the largest pro-homosexual lobby in the U.S.

In the past, unions with at least one private sector member have had to report their costs and expenses, but they have been able to lump them into large categories such as contributions, gifts, and grants. But now, under new federal rules, the NEA must detail where all its grants have gone, down to $5,000.

Just in case you thought the public education system was well balanced.