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<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman">With a Democratic, avowed anti-gun president
about to take office, along with Democratic majorities in both houses, the
pathway to gun banning is much smoother.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman">What do I have at stake in this? Nothing, as
far as guns are concerned, I don't own a gun. I don't have time to hunt very
often, and my camera gear takes away from any "gun budget". I loved
hunting birds when I was younger</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman">However, the way I see it, the only way for a
gun ban to work would be by a reduction in Fourth Amendment rights, which would
allow police to make searches and seizures without probable cause. We've already
seen these rights come under assault with the current president AND legislators,
Democratic and Republican, with the Patriot Act, which should have been called
the "Fear Act" because it was passed due fear, not patriotism.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman">Should this happen, there will be people who
will speak out, if enough of them do, the government will be forced to shut them
up. The easiest way to do that would be to curtail our First Amendment
guarantees.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman">The Bill of Rights is the archway under which
democracy passes, if any of the amendments are removed, the arch will collapse,
taking the rest and killing our freedoms.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman">It should be obvious that the amendments in
the Bill of Rights are interdependent. Unfortunately, people tend to have tunnel
vision and only look at one at a time.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman"></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt Tahoma">
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV style="BACKGROUND: #f5f5f5">
<DIV style="font-color: black"><B>From:</B> <A
title="mailto:scooterd408@hotmail.com CTRL + Click to follow link"
href="mailto:scooterd408@hotmail.com">Scott Dredge</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Sent:</B> Monday, November 10, 2008 11:26 PM</DIV>
<DIV><B>To:</B> <A title=mike_l_f@hotmail.com
href="mailto:mike_l_f@hotmail.com">mike_l_f@hotmail.com</A> ; <A
title=vision2020@moscow.com href="mailto:vision2020@moscow.com">viz</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Subject:</B> Re: [Vision2020] obama election / gun
purchases</DIV></DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>There isn't much support for reinstating the Federal Assault
Weapons Ban. There would need to be some kind of catalyst like there was
with the Stockton Massacre back in 1989 where some unstable guy got ahold of a
semi-automatic rifle and shot up a bunch of school children.<BR><BR><A
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockton_massacre">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockton_massacre</A><BR><BR>Before
the ban took effect, sales increased dramatically on AK-47s and Colt
AR-15s.<BR><BR>As far as I know, the VA Tech Massacre last year did not produced
any changes in gun control laws or lack thereof.<BR><BR>It's interesting to read
about how 'the sky is falling' on 2nd Amendment rights. This Obama
character looks to be an unstoppable juggernaut which is quite a contrast to an
impotent George W. Bush. I wonder why.<BR><BR>-Scott<BR><BR><BR>> From:
mike_l_f@hotmail.com<BR>> To: vision2020@moscow.com<BR>> Date: Tue, 11 Nov
2008 04:26:43 +0000<BR>> Subject: Re: [Vision2020] obama election / gun
purchases<BR>> <BR>> Setting aside anything that Senator Obama may have
said or done in the past, <BR>> people are concerned about his effect on
honest gun owners because on the <BR>> http://change.gov/agenda/urbanpolicy/
web site there is this statement -<BR>> <BR>> "They also support making
the expired federal Assault Weapons Ban permanent"<BR>> <BR>> If you
aren't familiar with firearms that may seem reasonable, but when you <BR>>
look at the details it's pretty obvious that it's not an effective tool <BR>>
against crime. First, the government admitted that “... the weapons banned
<BR>> by this legislation [1994 Federal Assault Weapons ban - since repealed]
were <BR>> used only rarely in gun crimes”. (National Institute of Justice,
March <BR>> 1999) Secondly, there was no positive effect. Violent crime has
continued <BR>> to trend downward since the ban was lifted, and rifles of any
description <BR>> continue to be involved in a tiny percentage of
crimes.<BR>> <BR>> The law was based largely on the way rifles look.
Features such as barrel <BR>> shrouds, pistol grips and other ergonomic
features may set them apart from <BR>> classic walnut stocked sporting
rifles, but seem pretty trivial from a <BR>> criminal perspective. The two
mechanical features mentioned are that these <BR>> firearms have a detachable
box magazine which can hold several cartridges, <BR>> and the self-loading
action allows you to fire one shot with each pull of <BR>> the trigger until
the magazine is empty.<BR>> <BR>> By comparison I was looking at a 1950's
Remington Woodsmaster rifle in Sure <BR>> Shot sporting goods last week. It
has a fine walnut stock, is self-loading, <BR>> has a detachable box magazine
and fires the 30-06, a far more powerful <BR>> cartridge than almost all of
the rifles on the "Assault Weapons" list. <BR>> There are many hundreds of
thousands of rifles similar to that in hunter's <BR>> closets around the
country. Do you wonder that they are concerned about <BR>> laws banning
similar firearms?<BR>> <BR>> But people say they only want to ban firearms
which can shoot 20 or 30 times <BR>> without reloading. It would be pretty
easy to put a larger magazine on the <BR>> Woodsmaster or it's cousins, and I
wonder when they will decide that also <BR>> includes shotguns. If you load
your pump shotgun with five 00 buckshot <BR>> cartridges and fire until it's
empty, you will have sent 45 heavy lead .33 <BR>> caliber balls at your
target. They won't travel as far as a rifle bullet, <BR>> but anyone within
100 yards will be in deadly danger.<BR>> <BR>> In other words, banning a
category of weapons which are only cosmetically <BR>> different than common
hunting rifles, and no more lethal than common <BR>> shotguns seems like a
cynical first step towards - what? There is no <BR>> evidence it's for crime
control.<BR>> <BR>> In 2003 the Center for Disease Control published a
review of studies from <BR>> several countries. They state that they found
"insufficient evidence to <BR>> determine the effectiveness of any of the
firearms laws reviewed for <BR>> preventing violence". (Wikipedia) It seems
that criminals are willing to <BR>> break laws to get weapons. There have
been several academic studies which <BR>> revealed many benefits that honest
citizens gain from owning firearms for <BR>> self defense, but this is
already too long to go into that.<BR>> <BR>> This country has done well
over the last two centuries for several reasons. <BR>> One of them is the
balance of power. We have been suffering through a <BR>> period where one
group has been acting to restrict some of our rights. This <BR>> years
election can probably be seen as a reaction to that. The pendulum <BR>>
swings. If the government distrusts the citizens so much that it fears <BR>>
leaving them effectively armed, at some future date will the party in power
<BR>> decide that elections are too dangerous, and they now have the power to
stop <BR>> the pendulum?<BR>> <BR>> - Mike<BR>> <BR>> Every
normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands,<BR>> hoist the
black flag, and begin slitting throats.<BR>> -- H. L. <BR>>
MENCKEN<BR>> <BR>> <BR><BR>
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<DIV><FONT face="Times New Roman">Kai Eiselein<BR>Editor, Latah
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