Printed in the USA.
The Gottlieb-Tartaro Report
Issue 057
September, 1999
Polls, polls, and more polls
And they’re all talking about guns.
Pollsters have come up with some interesting findings: the noted opinion research firm, Zogby America, found that 80.6% of 1,000 likely voters surveyed wanted the number one priority of the next presidential administration to be reducing crime and violence.
• 54% of African-Americans and 18-24 year-olds say crime and violence is a very high priority compared to 38.6% respondents overall.
If that sounds like a setup for gun control, it’s not. Zogby America found that 57.5% of those surveyed would support "Candidate A," whose platform was, "citizens have a right to own firearms; gun manufacturers should not be sued."
However, only 36% would support "Candidate B," whose position was that "gun owners should have federal ID; guns should be registered."
More interesting comparisons:
• Candidate A: mandatory jail time, 71.9%.
• Candidate B: more gun control laws, 24.1%.Zogby America asked respondents which presidential candidate would get their vote.
Results: r Bush, 47.8%; r Gore, 30.5%; r Ventura 9.2%. Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura got the surprising votes as a hypothetical third-party candidate.
• New gun laws:
A. More laws will prohibit acts of violence, 30.5%
B. Laws are cosmetic and Congress is over-reacting, 55.3%
C. Neither, 10.1%
• Handguns should be licensed like automobiles: Agree, 69%; Disagree, 28.7%.
• Handguns should be banned: Agree, 23.5%; Disagree, 73.8%.
• What’s the Second Amendment about? Protects the rights of individuals to own a gun, 61.6%; Protects the rights of states to form a militia, 27.5%.
• An overwhelming 70.5% of respondents agree that a woman walking to her car after a night class on in a shopping area should have the right to own a handgun for protection.
Final Zogby America item: "The alleged killers at Columbine High School in Colorado could have been stopped if the authorities were allowed to search the suspects, their lockers and their cars while they were on school property."
Agree, 61.9%; Disagree, 33.8%.
In a USA TODAY "Quick Question" poll asking readers, "Should proper gun use be taught in schools?" 78.1% said Yes, 21.8% said No.
CBS News aired yet another poll on guns and crime. Some astonishing results, given the network media’s usual bias against guns:• 22% thought nothing could have prevented the Columbine High shootings, 20% said better parenting, and 14% said gun control.
• 56% said better enforcement of existing laws is a better way to reduce violent crime than new gun laws. Only 4% said gun control should be a top issue for the government. 48% had a favorable opinion of the National Rifle Association, up from 40% in a 1995 CBS poll.
FEDERAL LEGISLATION
• Second Amendment Resolution: Rep. PHILIP M. CRANE (R-IL) recently introduced House Concurrent Resolution 176, which affirms the individual civil right to keep and bear arms.
It stipulates "the constitution provides that all individual citizens have the right to keep and bear arms, which right supersedes the power and authority of any government."
Crane is chairman of the House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Trade.
JOHN M. SNYDER, dubbed the "Dean" of gun lobbyists by the New York Times, commended Rep. CRANE. "Congressman Crane’s resolution could hardly come at a more opportune time. If adopted, it would put Congress squarely on record in support of this traditional American freedom. It would serve as a genuine antidote to the anti-gun, anti-self-defense hysteria emanating from the Clinton administration as well as from much of the establishment media."
SNYDER is public affairs director of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA).
• Gun Registration: Sen. DIANNE FEINSTEIN (D-CA) has told reporters that she intends to introduce a firearms registration bill this month. She said it will probably be offered as an amendment to must-pass legislation.
Sen. FEINSTEIN says it won’t pass, and isn’t likely to, but it puts on the table the first major push to register guns and license gun owners since Sen. Joe Tydings (D-MD) introduced such a bill for Lyndon Johnson shortly after Sen. Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June 1968. Tydings lost his next election.
• "Sniper" rifles: Another FEINSTEIN bill is much more likely to receive serious congressional consideration: she and Rep. ROD BLAGOJEVICH (D-IL) are preparing legislation that would ban .50-caliber long range rifles for all civilians "except for competitive marksmen who belong to .50-caliber shooting clubs. In those cases, the guns would be kept under the control of the club itself."
There are no local .50-caliber clubs in the United States, only a national organization.
Many gun rights advocates see this bill as a strategic move to begin the ban of one rifle after another, one by one. Not many gun owners are likely to get excited about a ban on .50-caliber rifles with a price tag of $4,000 to $6,000. Few can afford to own or shoot such a firearm.
But the bill will characterize .50-calibers as "sniper rifles." Once the phrase gets on the lawbooks, it will be easy to stretch it to include an ever-increasing number of guns.
• Youth Crime and Gun Show Bill: Top Republican negotiators on the gun and youth crime bill have flatly stated that the gun show background check measure approved by the Senate will not be included in any final compromise version.
The provision, which allows three business days for the background work to be completed, was added in a Senate amendment by Sen. FRANK LAUTENBERG (D-NJ) and won by one vote — the tie-breaking vote of Vice President AL GORE. A similar provision that allowed three calendar days, including weekends when records are harder to get, was defeated in the House.
However, the Republicans on the conference committee, Sen. ORRIN HATCH (R-UT) and Rep. HENRY HYDE (R-IL), hinted that some form of gun show legislation might come out of the joint House-Senate panel.
Sen. HATCH said, "It can’t pass as it sits. You can’t have that amendment written that way."
GUNS IN THE NEWS
FORMER COPS CONVICTED OF DELIVERY SERVICE GUN DEALINGTwo former transit system police officers in the greater Philadelphia area have been convicted in federal court of conspiracy, selling guns away from a licensed premise and related charges dating from 1993 and 1994.
CHARLES RANTIN and LAMONT McLAURIN were licensed gun dealers but were permitted only to sell guns out of RANTIN’s shop in Bristol, PA.
RANTIN was also a former Bristol Township police officer.
Prosecutors charged that RANTIN and LcLAURIN ran a thriving business delivering about 350 guns, some personally, to buyers who included other Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) workers and police officers.
Both men testified that they didn’t know their house calls were illegal. Numerous character witnesses took the stand on behalf of RANTIN and McLAURIN, but they were found guilty anyway.
McLAURIN was dismissed from the SEPTA police force late last year after being arrested for alleged involvement with a Russian mob extortion plot in New York. That trial is set for next month in New York.
RANTIN was removed from the Bristol police in January when he and McLAURIN were indicted for the delivery service gun sales.
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agent ROBERT WESCOE uncovered the case in 1995 during a routine inspection of dealer reports. He noticed that the majority of RANTIN’s business came from one or two buyers, often a sign that the guns are being resold illegally.
CALIFORNIA GUN SHOWS HIT WITH SALES BAN
The Los Angeles Board of Supervisors has voted 3 to 2 to outlaw all gun sales on county property. That will effectively sink gun sales at the Great Western Gun Show, which opens in October at the county fairgrounds in Pomona.
It doesn’t forbid gun shows from using the fairgrounds. Vendors can still exhibit their firearms at the 5,300 display tables that stretch for more than eight miles. They just can’t offer guns for sale, or even make arrangements to sell them at a later date.The show’s organizers say they will go to court to overturn the ban. Contracts have already been signed for shows in October and December, two of the four held annually.
The debate over gun shows is part of a fierce assault on firearms in California. Gun shows were vulnerable because attendees at previous gun shows were arrested for selling illegal firearms to undercover agents.
SCHOOL EXPULSIONS FOR GUNS DOWN 31%
In the midst of public clamor over school shootings, the U.S. Department of Education recently issued a report saying that fewer students were kicked out in the 1997-1998 year for bringing firearms to their public school than in 1996-1997.
Fifty states, the District of Columbia, and five U.S. territories reported that 3,930 students were expelled in 97-98 as compared to 5,724 expulsions reported for 97-98 — a 31% decline. There are about 52 million students in U.S. public schools.
Expulsion numbers included non-gun offenses. Illinois figures expulsions for BB guns, sling shots and other weapons; Maryland counts number of incidents, not expulsions; and Missouri included non-firearms such as brass knuckles, airguns and knives in its weapons expulsion count.
62% of expulsions were for handguns; 31% were for a bomb or hand grenade.
California and Texas were the only states to expel 300 or more students in the 97-98 school year.
The report is required by the 1994 Gun-Free Schools Act, which required states receiving federal education aid to pass their own laws ordering school districts to expel for one year any student who brings a firearm to school. All 50 states have passed such laws.
PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES AND HILLARY
All the Republican presidential candidates own or have owned guns, except for ELIZABETH DOLE, who never owned one. Nine own a gun now for sport or protection, counting a pellet gun owned by Sen. JOHN McCAIN.
Gun owners: LAMAR ALEXANDER (who quit the race); GARY BAUER; PAT BUCHANAN; GEORGE W. BUSH; ORRIN HATCH; ALAN KEYES; JOHN McCAIN; DAN QUAYLE. Democrat Vice President AL GORE also owns a gun.
STEVE FORBES and BILL BRADLEY once owned guns but don’t now.
GEORGE W. BUSH said it is a "false illusion" that new laws alone could prevent new outbreaks of violence in America. "I think I’m on the right side of the issue." He said enforcement of current gun laws would make streets safer. "I’ve been saying that all along. I may have raised it a decibel."
AL GORE, as usual, wants to ban "cheap handguns" and impose photo licenses for all new handgun owners. He also wants new ways to trace firearms, and to raise the age for handgun possession from 18 to 21. He would also bar juveniles from possessing "assault weapons" or large-capacity ammunition clips, impose new penalties on adults who sell guns to minors, and require safety locks on guns.
BILL BRADLEY, GORE’s only announced challenger for the Democratic nomination, has his own gun control plan: register all handguns and ban the manufacture and sale of cheap handguns.
Gun control advocate HILLARY CLINTON, eyeing a Senate run in New York, is trying to play both sides of the gun control street. In her summer-long "listening tour," she visited traditionally Republican upstate New York, where she said "most gun owners are responsible people." If anybody believed she was sincere, they only had to wait later the same day:
An Atlanta-area man killed nine people in the city and later killed himself, so HILLARY said, "I think it does once again urge us to think hard about what we can do to make sure that we keep guns out of the hands of children and criminals and mentally unbalanced people. I would hope that the Congress would take action on the legislation that is now pending before it as soon as possible."
FBI COVER-UP IN WACO
Rep. JAMES A. TRAFICANT (D-OH) recently said on the floor of the House of Representatives, "Mr. Speaker, over 80 Americans were killed at Waco, many of them women and children, actually burned to death, and the Texas Rangers have now uncovered new evidence that said the Federal Government covered up the truth and lied about Waco."
A recent memo said that federal agents had a friendly meeting with DAVID KORESH, leader of the Branch Davidians in the Waco compound, just 9 days before the assault. Yet federal agents testified in court that they "could not lure Koresh from the compound and were forced to engage in the assault."
TRAFICANT was outraged at the new revelations. "Unbelievable. The Justice Department is lying through their teeth. Mr. Speaker, 700 Federal agents, tanks, and rocket power attacked American civilians, 80 of them killed, many women and children burned to death, and nobody did anything about it. Nobody. It is time for an independent investigation into the FBI, the Justice Department, and the cover-up in Waco."
The chairman of the Texas Department of Public Safety said that federal officials need to explain why members of the Army’s secret Delta Force anti-terrorism squad were at the scene the day the compound burned.
Attorney General Janet Reno made a public announcement pledging to "get to the bottom" of why it took the FBI six years to admit that its agents may have fired potentially flammable tear gas cannisters on the final day of their standoff with the Branch Davidian cult.
RENO said she is "very troubled" by the developments and also said she had consistently been told that no incendiary devices were used at the compound.
Republicans in Congress have made clear that they will reopen hearings into the 51-day siege.
AROUND THE STATES
Florida: A proposed three-day waiting period in Pasco County, Florida, was soundly defeated recently in a vote of 5-0. BILL BUNTING of the Second Amendment Republican Club of Pasco County and other gun owners attended the packed county commissioners’ meeting and, by vigorous and closely-reasoned debate, convinced the commissioners to unanimously abandon the proposed local waiting period.
Kentucky: State Rep. ROBERT DAMRON has introduced BR 144, legislation that would prohibit cities and counties from filing reckless lawsuits against lawful firearm manufacturers. Kentucky is one of many states that have passed or are considering measures to thwart the "sue-them-into-bankruptcy" strategy used against firearms manufacturers by cities and counties in the past year.
California: For the first time in decades, Democrats control California’s Assembly, Senate and Governor’s office. One of the results is a runaway anti-gun rush that has caused alarm among gun owners nationwide.Three recent problems have drawn serious concern:
1) The California Assembly has passed a bill that would make it a misdemeanor to make or sell cheap handguns after January 1, 2001, and force all handguns to have a safety device and pass firing and drop-safety tests in independent laboratories. The bill passed by a 43-26 vote. It passed the Senate and went to Gov. GRAY DAVIS, who was expected to sign it.
2) California Attorney General BILL LOCKYER has dropped his predecessor’s appeal of a lawsuit brought against the California Department of Justice by Handgun Control, Inc., which now clears the way for the state to order owners of about 1,600 "assault" firearms to surrender them to law enforcement.
LOCKYER will ask the Legislature to provide funding to compensate owners who turn in the firearms, valued at $750 to $1,500 each.
A 1989 state law prohibited the sale and possession of 62 models of military-style firearms. But it let residents who owned the firearms at that time keep them if they registered them with the state by March 30, 1992.
LOCKYER’s predecessor, DAN LUNGREN, let people who owned the guns before the 1989 law was passed register them without prosecution or confiscation after the 1992 deadline.
Handgun Control and the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence sued LUNGREN and won a ruling from a San Francisco court in 1997 that invalidated any registration of the banned firearms after March 1992. LUNGREN appealed.
LOCKYER, a Democrat who succeeded Republican LUNGREN in the last election, appears to be going after owners who registered their firearms in good faith.
SAM PAREDES, deputy director of Gun Owners of California, said, "It is unreasonable to have citizens who tried to obey the law and who followed the directions of the attorney general to be forced to surrender their guns. That is ridiculous."
3) Another flap in California is making headlines: The list of supporters of a harsh anti-gun bill is incorrect, according to some opponents who found their names on the list.
The bill, SB 15 by Sen. RICHARD POLANCO (D-Los Angeles), would require all handguns to pass various safety tests. Various written analyses of the bill that lawmakers used to judge its merits incorrectly listed at least five groups as supporters, and one state senator opposed to the bill says he has confirmed 44 incorrect or unverifiable listings of support.
Among those wrongly listed as supporters of the gun-control bill: the California State Sheriffs’ Association, Butte County Sheriff SCOTT MACKENZIE, and the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department.
The analyses are so important because they are prepared by legislative staff and used by lawmakers and their staff in both the Assembly and the Senate before policy committee hearings and before floor votes. The analyses are printed and distributed to legislative offices and members of the news media, as well as being posted to the Internet on the Office of Legislative Counsel’s legislative Web site. People assume the information is correct and use it to form policy decisions.
JEWS AND GUNS
After BUFORD O’NEAL FURROW Jr. murdered a postal worker and wounded five people at the North Valley Jewish Community Center, he told the FBI when arrested after fleeing to Las Vegas that he intended the shootings as "a wake up call to America to kill Jews."
Buford has a long history of mental disturbance.
U.S. Attorney General JANET RENO was quick to call FURROW’s acts a "hate crime" and said, "I believe we must seriously explore the possibility of requiring the licensing of all handguns."
President CLINTON used the incident to push his appeal to Congress to pass a hate crimes bill that would make it easier for the Justice Department to investigate and prosecute people accused of hatred.
The American Jewish Congress and the Anti-Defamation League called for strict gun control provisions in the juvenile crime bill.
But not all Jewish organizations jumped on the hate crime and gun control bandwagon.
Rabbi DANIEL LAPIN, president of Toward Tradition, a national Jewish public policy foundation, criticized the American Jewish community for its response to FURROW’s act.
"The perpetrator of this outrage is simply an evil man who committed an evil act. That is it. Secular Jewish organizations are mistakenly attempting to blame this attack on a rising tide of anti-Semitism, a lack of ‘hate crime’ legislation and insufficient gun control."
Toward Tradition opposes "hate crime" legislation because Jewish tradition teaches that society must punish lawbreakers from their actions, not for their beliefs. "Hate crime legislation is the first step on a slippery slope to governmental thought control," warned Rabbi LAPIN. Toward Tradition also opposes additional gun regulations, and indeed advocates the ownership of firearms by law-abiding responsible citizens as an effective crime-control strategy."
Rabbi LAPIN’s words rang true as FURROW explained why he selected the Community Center instead of three other Jewish institutions he scouted before settling on his target: armed guards or tight security made his entry too risky, so he picked the defenseless and unarmed North Valley Center as easy prey.
Then the Jewish Defense League entered the fray, this time at a "Unity Rally" at the University of California, Northridge—a few miles from the Jewish Community Center—to honor the people who saved lives and provided comfort at FURROW’s attack. The event was crammed with bigwigs including Attorney General JANET RENO and California Governor GRAY DAVIS.
DAVIS told the crowd that he intended to get assault weapons off the street. Two JDL men shouted and booed the Democrat, who recently signed laws restricting gun purchases to one per month and tightening a ban on "assault weapons."
IRV RUBIN of JDL shouted, "The Second Amendment is just as important."
RUBIN and his friend handed out flyers reading, "Don’t leave yourself unarmed against those who want to murder you. Gun control laws are only observed by decent people and haters aren’t decent."
Jewish advocate DEBBIE SCHLUSSEL took President CLINTON and Anti-Defamation League leader ABRAHAM FOXMAN to task: "They want to take away the right of self-defense from law-abiding citizens. They want to hand victory to FURROW from the jaws of defeat.
"Contrary to FOXMAN’s and CLINTON’s illogic, if we are ever to restore peace to our streets, the right to keep and bear arms must be fully restored, not further eroded.
"As a Jewish American, I am alive today because my maternal grandparents, ISAAC and ADELE ENGEL — and my mother TOBY, who was born in Bergen Belsen concentration camp in Germany — survived the Holocaust.
"My grandfather told me about how the renowned Zionist leader, VLADIMIR JABLONSKI, visited Nazi Europe just prior to the concentration camps." In Yiddish he warned, "Yiddin, learn tzoo shissin!" — "Jews, learn to shoot!"
• PATRICIA McCLAIN is a conservative 42-year-old woman who opposes gun control. She’s mounting a primary challenge to Southern California Republican Congressman ELTON GALLEGLY. McCLAIN claims to have an IQ of 140. She has also posed nude in Playboy. Rep. GALLEGLY says he doesn’t quite know "how to respond to someone I don’t know and never heard of, and probably, if I had, I wouldn’t admit it."• Denver Mayor WELLINGTON WEBB, president of the U.S. mayor’s conference, recently called on mayors and police chiefs to march on Congress to press for gun control.
• More than 1,000 South African gun owners march through Cape Town to the gates of parliament in protest of planned draconian curbs on firearm ownership. They chanted "crime control is not gun control" and handed a petition to a representative of the Safety and Security Ministry.
• U.S. Senator BEN NIGHTHORSE CAMPBELL says he intends to re-join the National Rifle Association after quitting the organization a few years ago when the NRA criticized his voting record. The Colorado Republican says he fears Congress will pass unnecessarily restrictive gun laws in response to the Columbine High School massacre and other shootings around the country.
• The president of the American Bar Association has called for legislation requiring that background checks should take a minimum of three days.
• When mass killer MARK BARTON murdered his second wife, the woman’s father, JOE VANDIVER, was devastated with grief. But when CNN hosted an on-air guest who used his daughter as a symbol of the need for gun control legislation, he objected: "I just don’t want my daughter’s death to come down to gun control. He didn’t kill my daughter with a firearm. He killed my daughter with a hammer," VANDIVER told CNN. "I know MARK’s problems were not guns."
• BERNARD PARKS, Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, has called for "total gun control," saying that gun rights groups were promoting violence and hiding behind constitutional arguments.
• The Washington, D.C. Police Department is buying guns, offering $100 for every firearm turned in to them. It was a one-day program that brought in so many guns the Police extended it for a second day, but ran out of cash after distributing more than $225,000, according to USA Today.
• New York Attorney General ELLIOT SPITZER is trying for a settlement in the wave of municipal lawsuits against the gun industry. He wants to broker a settlement of suits filed by 26 cities and counties around the country if the industry will agree to a "code of conduct" drafted by his office. Some of the points in the "code:" gun makers would provide greater supervision of retail dealers; give greater cooperation with the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms; and other items not divulged. SPITZER has held off bringing a New York State lawsuit against the gun industry—which would be the first state suit—to recover costs of gun crimes in hopes of a total settlement.
• The Detroit Police Department has sold 6,659 handguns and 777 shotguns between 1992 and 1999 under a contract with Century International Arms in Vermont. The sales brought $800,000 toward the purchase of new weapons for the 4,000-member department. Now it turns out that some of those guns may have been re-sold to city gun shops, which are being sued by the city for the proliferation of illegal weapons. Detroit City Councilwoman BRENDA SCOTT said she wants police to melt the guns instead, something it already does with weapons taken from suspects.
• More than 500 million guns and other small arms are circulating around the world, says the United Nations Department for Disarmament in a recent report. The U.N. has agreed to hold an international conference on the illicit small arms trade no later than 2001. The U.N. department also said it wants a study on the feasibility of restricting the manufacture and trade in small arms to authorized manufacturers and dealers to be completed before the U.N. conference. There are no international agreements controlling the production and trade of such firearms, as there are concerning weapons of mass destruction.
MUGGER GETS BULLETS INSTEAD OF BUCKS
There was an old radio-era gag that went like this: STICKUP MAN: "Your money of your life." VICTIM: "Take my life, I’m saving my money for my old age."
Now we need a similarly clever gag about muggers.
JOE MEGERLE, 57, of Covington, Kentucky—across the Ohio river from Cincinnati—was taking a nice walk up Park Road when a red car passed him and then turned around to park in a pull-off.
The man in the car crossed the street, dropped something in a green park garbage container and then approached MEGERLE, asking several times if he had the time.
MEGERLE answered and just kept walking.
Then the guy pulled a gun on MEGERLE.
Your money or your life.
Big mistake.
MEGERLE was saving his money for his old age. And he had a gun, too, so he wasn’t going to offer his life.
While the robber stood there with his gun pointed at MEGERLE, MEGERLE did the reasonable thing: He shot the robber.
Not my life, your life.
MEGERLE fired two quick shots, one at the robber’s chest, one at his head.
The robber dropped his gun, fell, and then staggered back into the car, which took off.
MEGERLE picked up the fallen gun, holding it by the barrel with the man’s ball cap, which had fallen when the robber was shot.
MEGERLE then ran to a nearby intersection where he found construction superintendent JIM GILLESPIE and told him to call 911. "I just shot a man. I shot him twice."
Covington Police Officer DEAN ABNER responded to the scene. MEGERLE told the story, handed over the robber’s gun and his own gun, a .25-caliber handgun.
ABNER said, "He seemed like a real nice older fellow. He was shook up, but he had himself together. I admire the guy. A lot of people would have panicked and handed over their gun and their money. Here, justice was served."
MEGERLE holds a permit to carry a concealed weapon.
A suspect in the attempted robbery was later apprehended.
Now, MEGERLE will have an old age in which to spend his savings, thanks to his concealed handgun. Nice parting shot, Mr. MEGERLE.
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