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Title: 'Hunters & Shooters' endorse Obama, group says he supports gun rights
Source:
Raw Story
URL Source: http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Hunte ... dorses_Obama_says_he_0416.html
Published: Apr 16, 2008
Author: Nick Juliano
Post Date: 2008-04-16 13:59:52 by robin
Keywords: None
Views: 1009
Comments: 63
The American Hunters & Shooters Association said Obama's views of the 2nd Amendment have been unfairly criticized and its endorsement comes as Obama's opponents are characterizing him as an "elitist" and condescending towards gun-owners. The group sets itself apart from the "more extreme" elements of the pro-gun lobby like the National Rifle Association and Gun Owners of America. Unlike them, AHSA favors some gun-control measures like background checks and required safety courses for concealed weapons permits. (The NRA has accused the group of being a front for the anti-gun lobby.) Ray Schoenke, the hunters association's president, cited Obama's support of an amendment to a Department of Homeland Security funding bill that would prevent the government from confiscating citizens' guns during an emergency. Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY), Obama's opponent in the Democratic primary, and 16 other senators voted against the amendment. "She turned her back on America's gun owners," Schoenke said during a conference call organized by the Obama campaign Wednesday. Schoenke said the group reached out to the Obama campaign several weeks ago, before the recent controversy surrounding his comments about small-town voters. In announcing their support in the midst of the controversy, though, the group hoped to "set the record straight," about Obama's support of an individual's right to gun ownership, he said. "We understand that the gun issue is going to be very important in this election," said Bob Ricker, the group's executive director, citing an ongoing Supreme Court case regarding a handgun ban in Washington, DC. "Up until this time, the candidates haven't really been willing to talk about guns."
Less than a week after coming under fire for saying small-town Pennsylvanians "cling to" gun rights, Barack Obama picked up the endorsement of a pro-gun association that has backed Democratic candidates in the past.
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Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 22.
#3. To: robin (#0)
The AHSA is a bunch of sell-out bastards. To hell with them, they don't stand for the Second Amendment. Obama is a gun-grabbing socialist nigger and I don't trust him for one nano-second to protect our Second Amendment rights, his voting record is proof.
Do tell us what you really think. Way to win friends and influence people.
Bump to #4 Are the NRA and GOA "extreme" to you?
I can't say I follow gun issues closely enough to have an opinion one way or the other. I don't even know what GOA is. But I'd be interested to know whether the claim this organization makes about Obama's support of (and Hillary's opposition to) that amendment is correct.
http://www.investors.com/editorial/editorialcontent.asp? secid=1501&status=article&id=292204370724337 Gun Control: Barack Obama says he won't take folks' guns away as long as they're hunters. But when the hunted are his constituents, well, that's different: He opposes concealed carry and the right to self-defense. There's something about an election that brings out the sportsman in a Democratic presidential candidate. Recall John Kerry's sudden fondness for hunting four years ago. And speaking in Idaho earlier this year, Barack Obama told the crowd, "We got a lot of hunters in the state of Illinois, and I have no intention of taking away folks' guns." Except he does. In a 1996 questionnaire, Obama wrote that he "supported banning the manufacture, sale and possession of handguns." He says now that the survey was filled out by an aide who misrepresented his views. Yet his record since then is consistent with that view. Never mind that Illinois and the other 49 states have a lot of two-legged predators. Illinois resident Hale DeMar was prosecuted by the town of Wilmette for using a handgun to defend his home in 2003. Wilmette had imposed a ban on the possession of handguns, in effect making the town a gun-free zone. To correct the situation, several Illinois state legislators introduced SB 2165 to protect the right of self-defense for residents like DeMar. Obama voted against the bill. That self-defense bill protecting the right to bear arms for law-abiding citizens such as DeMar passed the Illinois state Senate and was enacted into law over the governor's veto (and Obama's opposition). It's no surprise, then, that Sen. Obama has come out in opposition to concealed- carry laws. In anticipation of an April 16 debate in Philadelphia on the anniversary of the Virginia Tech shootings, Obama told the Pittsburgh Tribune: "I am not in favor of concealed weapons. I think that creates a potential atmosphere where more innocent people could (get shot during) altercations." According to data from the U.S. Census Bureau, 65.7% of the U.S. population lives in the 39 right-to-carry states, and there's no indication such laws have turned our neighborhoods into the O.K. Corral. To the contrary, all the stats we've seen show a steep decline in murders and violent crimes after a state adopts a right-to-carry law. Virginia is one of those states, but the only one who had the right to carry last April 16 was Seung-Hui Cho. He shot 32 people to death on a Virginia Tech campus that had declared itself gun-free. One wonders if Cho would have even walked on campus with a gun if he knew his victims would be able to defend themselves. Or how the story would have been different had professor Liviu Librescu, a Holocaust survivor who lost his life barricading a classroom door so his students could escape, had been able to fire back. On the subject of the total ban on gun ownership in the District of Columbia, a Second Amendment case before the U.S. Supreme Court, the Nov. 23 Chicago Tribune said Obama believes in the right of local communities to enact common sense laws to combat violence and save lives. Obama believes the D.C. handgun law is constitutional. As pointed out by John Lott, senior research scientist at the University of Maryland, the D.C. murder rate fell three times faster than surrounding Maryland and Virginia in the five years before the 1977 ban, but rose nearly four times faster in the five years afterward. Since 1977, there has been only one year (1985) when the D.C. murder rate was lower than in 1976. Obama's Web site says: "He will protect the rights of hunters and other law- abiding Americans to purchase, own, transport and use guns for the purposes of hunting and target shooting" (emphasis ours). Not, apparently, for you to protect your wife and children.
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#5. To: X-15 (#3)
Obama is a gun-grabbing socialist nigger
#9. To: aristeides (#5)
#11. To: Jethro Tull (#9)
#22. To: aristeides (#11)
Replies to Comment # 22.