Oregons Firearm Ownership Privacy Bill to be Heard Monday by House Committee
NRA – ILA:
House Bill 4054 is scheduled to be heard in the state House Health Care Committee on Monday, February 13.
This hearing will be held at 1:00 p.m. in Hearing Room E of the Oregon Capitol. Sponsored by state Representative Jim Thompson (R-23), HB 4054 would prohibit the Public Employees’ Benefit Board from authorizing or requiring the collection of information or maintenance of records about firearms from eligible employees or family members applying for health benefits.
HB 4054 was introduced after state Senate Republican Leader Ted Ferrioli (R-30) secured commitments from both Kaiser Permanente and the Public Employee’s Benefit Board to purge gun ownership data that had been collected after implementing a new employee initiative called the “Health Engagement Model.” After Senator Ferrioli’s inquiries, both plans dropped the questions related to firearms. Read more
Where is Media Outrage to Fast and Furious?
This week Newsbusters offered an interesting lead into a story about Fast and Furious:
Deaths, guns, whistle-blowers and the highest law officer in the land stonewalling a congressional investigation are the juicy ingredients of a story network news reporters would love to cover – if a Republican were in office. However, when Attorney General Eric Holder testified on Thursday (February 2) before a House oversight committee investigating Operation Fast and Furious, the news was completely ignored by NBC and ABC (there was one full story on Friday’s CBS This Morning). The virtual blackout of Holder’s testimony continues an overall trend of ABC and NBC burying one of the Obama administration’s biggest scandals, despite continual coverage by their competitors at CBS, CNN and Fox News.
We’ve also noted that this story has had virtually no coverage in the evening news. As we’ve stated, who needs a cover-up when the media won’t cover the story anyway?
Kudos to Newsbusters for noting the lack of media attention on what is arguably a huge scandal for the Obama White House.
Newbusters: MRC Study: ABC and NBC Anything But Fast and Furious On Gunwalking Scandal
Is Jamaican Gun Story America’s Future?
This week a few outlets in the United States noted that Jamaican officials destroyed some 2,000 firearms. The Boston Globe was surprisingly one of those outlets and noted:
Roughly 2,000 firearms were melted down in a blazing furnace Tuesday as part of an effort designed to combat gun trafficking and corruption in Jamaica while reducing violent crime.
Police, government and U.N. officials destroyed pistols and revolvers by pitching them into a kiln glowing bright orange at a cement factory in the capital of Kingston. Most of the guns were decommissioned or seized in police operations over the years.
Let’s review the second paragraph – which notes, “Police, government and U.N. officials…” – because we have to ask why is the United Nations involved? Well, it gets more interesting. Consider this next example of how the story was reported:
William Godnick, a coordinator with the U.N. Regional Center for Peace Disarmament and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean, said the destruction of the guns “is the beginning of a long process in which we hope to destroy a much larger quantity.”
Not to sound like alarmists, but we’d like to know where this destruction of guns ends? The words “disarmament” concern us just a bit. And the story also continues, and again it sounds like a replay of what we heard about Mexico:
The large majority of the gangs’ weapons are smuggled from the United States.
Illegal guns come in on freighters and in “guns-for-ganja” deals by fishermen, who carry homegrown marijuana to nearby Haiti and return with pistols, revolvers and submachine guns — many of them believed to be from the U.S. as well.
So once again, problems elsewhere are going to be blamed on America guns, and only after is the “drug” connection made clear. But let’s review a key passage, namely “pistols, revolvers and submachine guns – many of them believe to be from the U.S.” as this again implies that in Miami or elsewhere people can just go to the gun shop and buy submachine guns off the shelf!
We’ll continue to watch as this story likely develops.
Houston Chronicle – Guns of choice for Mexican drug cartels?
This week the Houston Chronicle offered an interesting piece titled “ATF: the favorite guns of Mexican drug cartels,” which offered some interesting facts on which guns are most popular with the cartels – and notes that the AK-47 and AR-223 are among the most popular. But the article also notes something the media typically ignores:
There are also plenty of people who point to corruption in Mexico’s military as well as governments from Central America to Europe that could provide bulk shipments of guns to cartels.
They have noted that there is no way most of the guns used by Mexico’s cartels would be purchased over the counter at Texas gun stores. There is too much regulation and it would take too much time to outfit a private army using store-bought weaponry.
This is a fact that should be obvious. Anyone who has bought a single gun can know that with background checks, which are required to be conducted at all gun shops and despite a few high profile examples showing otherwise are conducted at the vast majority of gun shows.
LA Times Photo Brings Up More Questions in Fast and Furious
Are these Fast and Furious guns or military hardware?
This week The Los Angeles Times is reporting that “Mexican officials have arrested a reputed enforcer for the country’s most powerful drug cartel – a man also alleged to have amassed weapons from the U.S. government’s failed Fast and Furious gun-smuggling operation.”
But let’s take a look at that photo that accompanied the story. While those could be semi-automatic AK-47s, as in the commercially available model, it is fascinating that there appears to be a grenade launcher on the far right and a .30 caliber machine gun in the center. These aren’t the usual items you find at any gun shop!
NRA News: Women Against Mayors Who Are Against The Second Amendment
Cam Edwards talks to Anna Rittgers - Independent Women’s Forum
NRA News: Virginia Senate Votes to Repeal One Gun-A-Month
Cam Edwards talks to State Senator Charles Carrico (R-VA)
Reuters Lets Anti-Gun Zealot Get Last Word
Reporting on the “Virginia Senate votes to repeal limit on gun purchases,” Reuters seems to have taken the sour grapes approach to reporting. This included the final passages coming from the Virginia Center for Public Safety, including this quote from Lori Hass:
“The Senate today pandered to special interest groups and has just opened the door to begin illegal gun trafficking again in Virginia.”
Well it makes for a compelling kicker, is it accurate even? This isn’t the special interest if the vast majority of voters pushed for this. But apparently anytime an anti-gun type doesn’t like a ruling, they blame the “special interest” and unfortunately the media gives this added weight by supporting this line of thinking.
Who Guards the Guards: NYPD Officer Pleads Guilty of Gun Smuggling
This past weekend New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg made his case for stricter gun laws, but we ask would they do any good if those trusted to have guns break the law? The Associated Press via The Wall Street Journal noted this week that Brooklyn NYPD officer William Masso could face five to six years in prison for gun smuggling!
He reportedly attempted to a cache of firearms that included “three M-16 rifles, one shotgun, 16 handguns,” as well as slot machines and “thousands of cartons of cigarettes, along with counterfeit merchandise.” But even worse, is the fact that Masso was “recruiting other law enforcement officers to join the scheme.”
This makes us wonder if Mayors Against Illegal Guns shouldn’t look closer to home instead of targeting distant gun shows?
NPR Offers Biased Take on Virginia Gun Laws
How does National Public Radio see the new lifted restrictions on firearm sales in Virginia? Basically the way they report on it, it will only open the flood gates to criminals. The story offered this introduction to an interview between host Robert Siegel and newspaper reporter Bill Sizemore:
Twenty years ago, Virginia had a not-so-flattering reputation as a haven for illegal gun runners. Traffickers would buy batches of guns legally in the state, and sell them on the black market. With the Virginia guns turning up at crime scenes up and down the Eastern seaboard, the state legislature decided it was time to act — a law was passed to limit gun purchases to one a month. But gun rights activists have fought to overturn it, and on Monday, the Virginia Senate approved legislation to repeal it.
Is a “reputation” really what this is about? This type of reporting doesn’t offer all the facts, including that gun sales are up and crime is down. But that would get in the way of this reporting.
But the interview also included an interesting exchange:
SIEGEL: Now, Virginia is a state where there’s a great deal of gun ownership and I assume the Republican legislators and the governor figure the public opinion is on their side with these moves.
SIZEMORE: I think they do. Virginia certainly is a big gun-owning state, particularly in the more rural areas where hunting is a, you know, longstanding tradition. You know, in the more urban areas where crime has been a problem, I think you find more support for gun control, but at the moment, the gun enthusiasts certainly seem to have the upper hand.
Let’s review: Siegel makes it clear that it is “public opinion,” but Sizemore by responds by trying to suggest that there is support for gun control, yet “gun enthusiasts” have the “upper hand.” Isn’t this a naïve way to look at it this issue? Clearly the support for gun control isn’t strong enough, but once again the anti-gun types try to pass this off as if it is the voice of a few radicals.
At least the host notes there is “public opinion,” but too bad the media can’t see it that way.
