And some say the Herald is a Conservative newspaper.
Just wait until any new gun control legislation begins debate in the State House...
(Wait a minute... what debate? They'll pass the crap with little or no dissent).
[sad2]
http://news.bostonherald.com/editorial/view.bg?articleid=186086&srvc=home
Just wait until any new gun control legislation begins debate in the State House...
(Wait a minute... what debate? They'll pass the crap with little or no dissent).
[sad2]
Under the gun, nation surrenders to NRA: Among the consequences, increasing police budgets
By Dan K. Thomasson
Saturday, March 3, 2007
WASHINGTON - The nation’s police chiefs have a serious problem. Their troops are being outgunned, and to correct the situation taxpayers must increase law-enforcement budgets substantially or find some way to ban the circulation of weapons and ammunition meant for the battlefield - mainly, semiautomatic assault rifles and armor-piercing bullets.
Because the latter alternative is not politically practical, the cost of law enforcement can be expected to rise considerably. And where citizens are unwilling to spend the money to equip their guardians with weapons and armor now readily available to criminals, the threat to themselves and those they hire to protect them is likely to increase proportionately.
No matter how much evidence is supplied to back up their arguments and how loudly the associations that support them yell, the chiefs’ chances of winning out against the insanity of the nation’s gun culture are slim to none. Actually, make that none. Maryland is mulling a bill to ban semiautomatic rifles, and the opposition has been loud and persistent.
This is a land where the right to traffic in firearms, no matter how dangerous to law and order, is protected by constitutional language designed for a militia carrying muskets and enforced by a self-appointed virulent lobby called the National Rifle Association. It purports to represent sports shooters, but in reality is the arm of the manufacturers and importers who profit from the carnage.
To emphasize just how unforgiving are those who subscribe to the NRA’s opposition to any restraints, one should consider the case of Jim Zumbo.
Until a few days ago, Zumbo was a revered figure in hunting circles. Hunting and non-hunting enthusiasts alike avidly watched his TV shows and read his columns about big-game treks. Then Zumbo foolishly ventured the opinion that semiautomatic assault weapons really had no place in hunting. Moreover, he linked these weapons with the “T” word.
Now nearly everyone knows that, since 9/11, to mention that word (it stands for “terrorist”) is to cause near panic and bring instant and severe punishment to the offender. Within hours, Zumbo’s column was canceled and his cable TV show eliminated. All this occurred despite a profuse apology from an obviously desperate Zumbo.
Would it be out of place here to suggest that this swift and unrelenting attack by the NRA on one of its own proves conclusively that Zumbo was right in suggesting that terrorism is not unknown to the gun lobby? After all, the NRA has been terrorizing its political opponents for decades. As a result, the lobby has managed to foster a national armory of privately owned firearms that exceeds some 300 million.
That is why the increasingly frantic efforts of law enforcers to win some sort of reasonable control over the kinds of weapons they face on the street are pretty much futile. Congress has refused to renew an expired law that banished military assault rifles. So the bill now being argued in Maryland to ban the assault weapons at the behest of law enforcement probably doesn’t have a prayer.
In the meantime, the intrepid hunter who wants to blast away at animals from bears to (as Zumbo complained) prairie dogs can do so with impunity. How sporting!
http://news.bostonherald.com/editorial/view.bg?articleid=186086&srvc=home