Purchases made 15 days after Tucson massacre, just over 100 miles away at "Crossroads of the West" gun show
In its frontline rhetoric, the NRA claims that "guns don't kill people, people do," and that the solution to gun violence is not new laws or gun control for "law abiding citizens", but control of criminals and enforcement of existing laws. These are the talking points the NRA hits over and over again, and promulgates to its membership to repeat on que.
New York City Investigates Arizona Gun Show
By MARC LACEY
Published: January 30, 2011
PHOENIX - Weeks after a shooting left six dead and 13 injured in Tucson, New York City sent undercover investigators to an Arizona gun show and found instances in which private sellers sold semiautomatic pistols even after buyers said they probably could not pass background checks, city officials said.
The investigation, part of an effort by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's administration to crack down on illegal gun sales nationwide, took place Jan. 23 at the Crossroads of the West Gun Show in Phoenix, officials said.
As the story went on to explain, such sales are technically illegal, but the law simply isn't being enforced:
Private, unlicensed sellers are not required to run federal background checks, but it is a violation of federal law to sell guns to people if sellers suspect they are felons or mentally ill or are otherwise prohibited from buying. In the case of Jared L. Loughner, who is accused of opening fire on the crowd in Tucson on Jan. 8, the gun used in the shootings was bought at a licensed gun dealer, and he passed a background check, the authorities said.
In two instances, the New York undercover officers specifically said before buying a gun, "I probably couldn't pass a background check," but were still sold guns, city officials said.
In a third case, an investigator bought a Glock pistol and two high-capacity magazines like the ones used in the Tucson shooting. Such purchases were made without any background check but were perfectly legal.
In covering this story, Chris Brown on the politicalcorrection blog "Can't Pass A Background Check To Buy Guns? No Problem" included the following two videos of investigators' purchases. The first is one of the first two cases mentioned:
A partial transcript of the above, from the Times (emphasis added):
Investigator: "So, you're not one of those, you know, dealer guys, right?"
Seller: "No. No tax, no form, you don't have to do transfers or nothing."
Investigator: "Yeah, yeah."
Seller: "Just see an Arizona ID and that's it with me."
Investigator: "So no background check?"
Seller: "No."
Investigator: "That's good, because I probably couldn't pass one, you know what I mean?"
The seller sold the gun for $500.
The second video is the third case mentioned in the Times story:
With survivors and family members horrific gun violence in attendence, Mayors Against Illegal Guns(MAIG) today announced a major new plan to keep guns out of the hands of people who already aren't supposed to have them under existing law-like the shooters in three historic catastrophes: Columbine, Virginia Tech, and Tucson.
"The time has clearly come to finally fulfill the intent of the common sense gun law passed after the 1968 assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Bobby Kennedy, by creating a loophole-free background check system for the sale of firearms," said MAIG co-chair NY Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
"The best way to respond to the heinous acts of violence we have seen in our nation's history is to prevent them from ever happening again," added MAIG co-chair Mayor Thomase Menino. "Lax creening in response to these tragic shootings is no virtue."
Targetted Plan
While recent polling confirms strong support--even among gun-owners--for many measures that the NRA opposes, this newly-proposed plan only targets a subset of such measures, specifically conforming to NRA rhetoric blaming bad people, not guns--but it's rhetoric that the NRA has never actually honored in practice. Simply put, it is aimed at making the existing system of background checks--which does not threaten the rights of sane, law-abiding gun-owners--actually do its job.
Their proposal has two simple components: First, get everyone into the background check system who belongs there. Second, do background checks for every gun sale.
Broad Support Highlighted by Historical Family Mambers
The system had its origins in the 1968 legislation passed in response to the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy, which established the principle, which has since been systemized, but never adequately funded or enforced. Relatives of both men were on hand to lend their support, along with former Bush Attorney General Michael Mukasey, who joined with Bloomberg and Menino to present a broad bipartisn front pushing for adequate law enforcement.
"For decades we have tolerated senseless gun violence, which has struck down too many of our fellow citizens, particularly our young people," said Martin Luther King III, President and CEO of the King Center. "If we want to create a nonviolent society, we must enforce our public safety laws to keep the angry and dangerous few from destroying the peace and harmony of the many. I wholeheartedly join Mayor Bloomberg in calling on the President and Congress to finally deliver on the long unfilled promise to make sure that every gun buyer passes a background check. It is unconscionable to do anything less."
"President Kennedy and Senator Robert Kennedy, my uncle and my father, dedicated their lives to serving their country," said Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, former Lieutenant Governor of Maryland and eldest child of Robert F. Kennedy. "But because of assassins armed with guns, they both made the ultimate sacrifice, and their lives of service were cut short. The 34 Americans whose lives are cut short by a gun each day may not be presidents or senators, but each life is a future cut short, a life of accomplishments left undone, and a family torn apart. We owe a duty to each victim to make their life, and their sacrifice, a part of the national movement to fix our gun background check system so it is thorough, complete and comprehensive."
Fulfilling the Historical Intention
The principle established in 1968 was systemized by the Brady Bill of 1993, which established the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, (NICS), which went into operation in 1998. It was further strengthened by the NICS Improvement Act, passed in In April 2007, after the Virginia Tech massacre which claimed the lives of 32 people, but the system still isn't working properly, as it's underfunded--with just 5.3% of needed funding--and lacks the proper incentive structure to ensure compliance by all responsible parties.
In a press statement, MAIG explained how the existing system fails to do its job:
What is the state of the union when a madman can come within a whisker of assassinating a member of Congress? When his rantings and ravings and drug use don't stop him from getting a high-capacity magazine? When a sophomore in high school can show up to school with a gun in his backpack, and accidentally shoot two of his classmates?
I'm not sure, but I know I'd really like to hear President Obama address this during his SOTU address--without platitudes, but with an actual plan of action. One which might include demanding that the Senate confirm his nominee to run the ATF forthwith, fixing gaps in government databases of mental health and criminal records, requiring states to share data on those who have been deemed mentally unfit, questioning the intelligence of selling high-capacity magazines to just anyone, allowing concealed carry without a permit, as Arizona and two other states do, wondering whether those with firearms should just be able to meander up next to their member of Congress, and closing loopholes that allow the crazed and criminal to get guns at gun shows while firmly ensconced on terrorist watch lists.
Oh yeah, it would also mean he is FAR to the Right of that key element in our democracy known as the American People:
"Large majorities of Americans agree with the 2008 Supreme Court ruling that the Second Amendment confers an individual right to own guns, and Americans strongly oppose efforts to ban handguns," said Bob Carpenter, vice president of American Viewpoint, the Republican polling firm that joined with Democratic firm Momentum Analysis to conduct the survey. "But Americans and gun owners feel with equal fervor that government must act to get every single record in the background-check system that belongs there and to ensure that every gun sale includes a background check. Most Americans view these goals, protecting gun rights for the law-abiding and keeping guns from criminals, as compatible."
Some findings from the poll results, provided exclusively to The Huffington Post:
-- 90 percent of Americans and 90 percent of gun owners support fixing gaps in government databases that are meant to prevent the mentally ill, drug abusers and others from buying guns.
-- 91 percent of Americans and 93 percent of gun owners support requiring federal agencies to share information about suspected dangerous persons or terrorists to prevent them from buying guns.
-- 89 percent of Americans and 89 percent of gun owners support full funding of the law a unanimous Congress passed and President George W. Bush signed after the Virginia Tech shootings to put more records in the background-check database.
-- 86 percent of Americans and 81 percent of gun owners support requiring all gun buyers to pass a background check, no matter where they buy the gun and no matter who they buy it from.
-------
Closing the so-called "terror gap" has particularly strong support. A 2010 Government Accountability Office report found that during the past six years, individuals on the terror watchlist were able to buy firearms or explosives from licensed U.S. dealers 1,119 times.
The NRA has opposed bipartisan legislation closing the gap on the grounds that the list is flawed -- some individuals are put on the list by mistake, while many who pose legitimate threats are never added.
But this position puts the NRA far to the right of even its members. A survey last year by conservative pollster Frank Luntz found that 82 percent of NRA members supported "prohibiting people on the terrorist watch lists from purchasing guns." Eighty-six percent agreed with the statement that the country can "do more to stop criminals from getting guns while also protecting the rights of citizens to freely own them."
This folks, is about whether we want democracy by ballot or intimidation by bullet. It goes to the very heart of who we are and want to be, and it is most certainly an issue of National Security--or security for our democracy. Lets hope President Obama does the right thing.
A new bipartisan poll conducted for Mayors Against Illegal Guns, shows strong support for stronger gun control measures, including strenghtened implementation of existing laws as well new measures--both of which have been vehemently opposed by the NRA. Support for some measures ranges as high as 80 or 90 percent, while majorities opposed only two measures that were asked about. The poll of 1003 adults included a sub-sample of 451 gun owners, whose responses once again showed that the NRA does not represent the views of most American gun owners.
Three measures that polled over 90% support--including among gun-owners--were:
(1) Requiring gun owners to alert police if their guns are lost or stolen (94% support among all adults & gun owners).
(2) Fixing the gaps in government databases that are meant to prevent the mentally ill, drug abusers and others from buying guns (90% among all adults & gun owners).
(3) Requiring federal agencies to share information about suspected dangerous persons or terrorists, in order to prevent them from buying guns (91% among all adults, 93% among gun owners).
Another five measures had support of 80% or more:
(1) Fully funding the enforcement of the law Congress passed after the Virginia Tech massacre to prevent people with a history of mental illness from buying guns (89% among all adults and gun owners).
(2) Require all gun buyers at gun shows to pass a criminal background check (89% among all adults and 85% among gun owners).
(3) Prohibiting people on the terrorist watch lists from purchasing guns (88% among all adults and gun owners).
(4) Fully enforce gun laws currently on the books (83% among all adults and gun owners).
(5) Tracking bulk purchases of assault rifles, which have become the weapon of choice of Mexican drug cartels (81% among all adults and 80% among gun owners).
Another five measures had landslide support, in the 60s and 70s, while two measures had majority support in the 50s, and two measures were opposed by a majority. Charts showing the breakdown--including strength of support and/or opposition--are on the flip.
"Our coalition of mayors has fought for years to fix our federal background check system and close loopholes that give dangerous people a way to get around the requirement altogether," Bloomberg said in a statement on the poll's findings. "This poll shows that, particularly in the wake of yet another tragic mass shooting, Americans and gun owners agree with our efforts. If the tragedy in Tucson was not enough to ensure that Congress finally takes action, we hope this clear call for reform from the public will add to the groundswell of support."
Closing the so-called "terror gap" has particularly strong support. A 2010 Government Accountability Office report found that during the past six years, individuals on the terror watchlist were able to buy firearms or explosives from licensed U.S. dealers 1,119 times.
The NRA has opposed bipartisan legislation closing the gap on the grounds that the list is flawed -- some individuals are put on the list by mistake, while many who pose legitimate threats are never added.
But this position puts the NRA far to the right of even its members. A survey last year by conservative pollster Frank Luntz found that 82 percent of NRA members supported "prohibiting people on the terrorist watch lists from purchasing guns." Eighty-six percent agreed with the statement that the country can "do more to stop criminals from getting guns while also protecting the rights of citizens to freely own them."
This evening on the Situation Room, Blitzer had on retired Army Colonel Bill Badger, in order to tell the story of his part in the takedown of Jared Loughner. I can't find any video of it, but Badger's composure and recall of detail in retelling the story makes the segment worthwhile on its own. As the interview is wrapping up, the Colonel makes use of his brief moment of fame to actually try and make something good come out of this travesy:
BLITZER: Colonel, do you own or carry a gun?
BADGER: No.
I have got a 21-year-old son. And when he was born, my wife made me get rid of .38. I had one up until that time.
But, you know, if I could say something right now, that something is drastically wrong with what's going on in our United States right now. And when an individual is turned down to get into the military and then can be -- is able to go out and buy a .9-millimeter Glock pistol, and he had one of the -- or his clips were the extended clips that were limited to law enforcement only, and, you know, that -- or somebody has to put a stop to that.
BLITZER: Colonel Bill Badger, retired U.S. Army, thanks so much, not only for joining us. Much more importantly, thanks for doing what you did Saturday morning in Tucson. We appreciate it very much.
BADGER: Wolf, and thank you. And keep up the great work.
Doubtful this will put the whole issue of "maybe doing something to stop this happening again" into serious discussion but having a 74 year old Army veteran cool enough to disarm a maniac even after being shot in the head himself speak out in favour of better gun control is a pretty decent opening for the topic. Between him and the Sherriff, some sterotypically right wing figures have stepped up to speak for sanity.
News of the Omaha school shooting yesterday broke around the same time that I was working on my diary about solitary confinement, "I was in prison and you visited me", that I posted earlier today. Naturally, my thoughts connected the two: in both cases, needly suffering is spread because of mindless fear that prevents people from thinking rationally about how best to minimize harm to innocents, and provide the possibility of healing and rehabilitation to troubled souls. And both cases implicate organized rightwing power which even conservatives 30 or 40 years ago would have regarded as beyond the fringe.
This is particularly evident in any case involving gun violence, where the fingerprints of the NRA--the gun manufacturers' lobby--are never hard to find. I wrote recently about the Washington Post's year-long investigation into the hidden world of guns, including the extraordinary lengths that the NRA goes to in order to cripple law enforcement from effectivel working to crack down on those who traffic in guns that are routinely used in violent crimes. The NRA's general membership doesn't support this extremist position--see, for example, this LA Times report on one one poll of NRA members and other gun owners. And why shouldn't they have sensible positions? The vast majority of gun-owners really are law-abiding, after all.
But those who aren't are, apparently, far too valuable as customers for the gun manufacturer's lobby to cut loose of. And of course, this also leaves the door open for the large number of folks who are essentialy law-abiding, but who could become dangerously troubled, whether gradually over time, or rather abruptly, just like Robert Butler Jr. did. Because the NRA is in the business of selling fear, the last thing it wants is sensible regulation--even though poll after poll has shown that its own membership favors just such an approach. Which is one reason why progressives instantly think about the NRA in moments like this. The fact is, thanks to the NRA, when someone starts acting crazy--as Butler did shortly before his shooting spree--keeping a gun out of their hands is one of the hardest things to do.
A demonstration of this tragic fact--albeit with a happy ending--was recounted by Hilzoy at Obsidian Wings at the time of the Virginia Tech shootings, in which she described her experience with a friend who was overtly dangerously threatening at the time:
In the beginning was the promise--the promise of protecting America from gun violence by enacting sensible gun laws in face of special interst opposition. And the pormise was very clear. Not just from candidate Obama, but from the man who became his chief of staff. Here's then-congressman Rahm Emanuel (D-IL) speaking at DC's annual Stand Up For a Safe America event sponsored by the Brady Center on May 15, 2007:
White House delayed rule meant to stop gun flow to Mexico
By Sari Horwitz and James V. Grimaldi
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, December 17, 2010; 11:37 PM
This spring, President Obama promised Mexican President Felipe Calderon that he would work to deter gunrunning south of the border. Behind the scenes, White House officials were putting the brakes on a proposal to require gun dealers to report bulk sales of the high-powered semiautomatic rifles favored by drug cartels.
Justice Department officials had asked for White House approval to require thousands of gun dealers along the border to report the purchases to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. ATF investigators expected to get leads on suspected arms traffickers.
Senior law enforcement sources said the proposal from the ATF was held up by the White House in early summer. The sources, who asked to be anonymous because they were discussing internal deliberations, said that the effort was shelved by then-White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, a veteran of battles with the gun lobby during the Clinton administration.
Of course Rahm denied it--through a spokesman:
Ben LaBolt, a spokesman for Emanuel, who is running for mayor of Chicago, said Emanuel "did not stop the policy from being implemented." Emanuel "has never taken a back seat to anyone when it comes to standing up to the NRA to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous criminals," LaBolt said.
White House spokesman Reid Cherlin said, "We don't comment on interagency policy deliberations, but the president is committed to cracking down on violence on the Southwest border."
But the Post's in-depth reporting on this series has been very solid and very detailed. And desides, if Rahm didn't block this proposal, then who did? The Tooth Fairy?
Almost worse than this backroom duplicity is the supposed explanation, floated in a number of the Post's stories, that NRA opposition has been key to Democratic defeats, such as the 1994 mid-terms, a narrative that completely ignores the much more credible explanation offered in Three's a Crowd: The Dynamic of Third Parties, Ross Perot, and Republican Resurgence by Ronald B. Rapoport and Walter J. Stone, which used a comprehensive statistical analysis to show that Democrats lost whwhere Perot ran strong, and which explains in detail how Republicans intentionally wooed Perot voters after Clinton/Gore spurned them--and Perot personally--by passing NAFTA, even without the sorts of strong labor and environmental protections they had originally promised.
So, not only is their politically-motivated double-cross going on here, it's motivated based on faulty premise that excuses neo-liberal sell-out politics as the real problem responsible for Democratic losses.
A story by Eric Lichtbau in the NY Times, published just before the report's release began as follows:
Lax State Gun Laws Tied to Crimes in Other States
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
Published: September 26, 2010
WASHINGTON - Nearly 600 mayors nationwide, led by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York and other city leaders, are mounting a new campaign to identify states with lax gun laws and push for tighter restrictions to prevent the trafficking of guns used in crimes.
A study due to be released this week by a coalition called Mayors Against Illegal Guns uses previously unavailable federal gun data to identify what it says are the states that most often export guns used in crimes across state lines. It concludes that the 10 worst offenders per capita, led by Mississippi, West Virginia and Kentucky, supplied nearly half the 43,000 guns traced to crime scenes in other states last year.
The study also seeks to draw a link between gun trafficking and gun control laws by analyzing gun restrictions in all 50 states in areas like background checks for gun purchases, policies on concealed weapons permits and state inspections of gun dealers. It finds that, across the board, those states with less restrictive gun laws exported guns used in crimes at significantly higher rates than states with more stringent laws. An advance copy of the study was provided to The New York Times.
"There are 12,000 gun murders a year in our country, and this report makes it perfectly clear how common-sense trafficking laws can prevent many of them," said Mr. Bloomberg, who is the co-chairman of the coalition with Mayor Thomas M. Menino of Boston. "For mayors around the country, this isn't about gun control. It's about crime control."
The report's executive summary lists four key findings:
A new report this week from Mayors Against Illegal Guns reveals the massive--and growing--role played in the Mexican drug war by crime guns trafficked into Mexico from US states--particularly border states, with Arizona leading the way on a per-capita basis. This comes just on the heels of a new report from the Pew Hispanic Center, showing a dramatic drop in the rate of illegal immigration.
A press release from Mayors Against Illegal Guns that accompanied the report stated:
The more than 500 members of the bi-partisan coalition of Mayors Against Illegal Guns today released a new report, entitled The Movement of Guns Across the U.S.-Mexico Border, that reveals that Southwest border states supplied a disproportionate number of crime guns to Mexico from 2006 to 2009. The report analyzes new data made available to Mayors Against Illegal Guns by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF). The new data, released by the coalition co-chaired by New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino, builds on the coalition's first groundbreaking source state analysis, The Movement of Illegal Guns in America, released in December 2008.
"Illegal guns and their accompanying violence devastate communities across our country, now we know more about how guns purchased here have helped sustain violent drug wars in Mexico," said coalition co-chair and New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg. "I hope this report from Mayors Against Illegal Guns is a wake up call for policy makers - it is too easy for criminals and traffickers to get guns."
Just as Arizona Governor Jan Brewer finally admits that there are no beheaded corpses in her state's deserts. these two reports combine to show that the entire wave of hysteria she's been riding and helping to foment has everything exactly backwards: hard times are not just reducing illegal immigration, according to Pew, but are actually reducing the total number of undocumented immigrants in the US, at the same time that US-bought guns are exporting violence to Mexico.
Perhaps most striking is the dramatic decrease in the "Time-to-Crime" in Mexico, which experts regard as a key indicator of illegal gun trafficking:
As kovie noted in Quick Hits, today the SCOTUS ruled that that Second Amendment "applies equally to the federal government and the states", as Alito wrote in his opinion. The case was around a ban on handguns in Chicago and the suburb of Oak Park, IL, which the Brady Center says is the last two places where such bans exist, following the SCOTUS decision in the Heller decision to strike down DC's ban here. Technically the decision did not strike down the ban, but ordered a federal appeals court to re-examine the decision. But the general consensus I'm hearing appears to be that the laws will be struck down sooner or later.
Post-Heller, the District of Columbia officials rightfully enacted stringent requirements in order to get a handgun, including demonstrating knowledge of firearms use and DC laws, completing a firearms safety course including at least four hours of instruction, fingerprinting, submitting photographs, background check, and others (and speaking as a resident, I'm grateful for these restrictions). All of these are reasonable, and if they go down, DC will probably once again be known as the murder capital of the nation. Not to mention that the NRA-sponsored amendment to the Voting Rights Act that was, which would eliminate other restrictions like a ban on firearms within a certain distance from schools or playgrounds, as well as banning the city from enacting any laws relating to firearms. The amendment was rejected as the basis for a compromise on the back of unanimous opposition from the DC Council and the Mayor, but was considered for a time by Norton and drives home the point on how gun "rights" advocates are hell-bent on eliminating what's left of urban gun control among nearly 600,000 residents (and more when VA and MD residents stream in on weekdays) in the nation's capital.
But hey, as Adam notes at DailyKos, if you're concerned about your safety, Alito and the majority says you can just get your own damn gun:
[P]etitioners and many others who live in high-crime areas dispute the proposition that the Second Amendment right does not protect minorities and those lacking political clout. The plight of Chicagoans living in high-crime areas was recently highlighted when two Illinois legislators representing Chicago districts called on the Governor to deploy the Illinois National Guard to patrol the City's streets. The legislators noted that the number of Chicago homicide victims during the current year equaled the number of American soldiers killed during that same period in Afghanistan and Iraq and that 80% of the Chicago victims were black. Amici supporting incorporation of the right to keep and bear arms contend that the right is especially important for women and members of other groups that may be especially vulnerable to violent crime. If, as petitioners believe, their safety and the safety of other law-abiding members of the community would be enhanced by the possession of handguns in the home for self-defense, then the Second Amendment right protects the rights of minorities and other residents of high-crime areas whose needs are not being met by elected public officials.
In somewhat better SCOTUS news today, the court also ruled that a right-wing Christian group can't get legal funding and recognition from a California college if they discriminate on the basis of religion and sexual orientation.
The Supreme Court says a law school can legally deny recognition to a Christian student group that won't let gays join.
The court on Monday turned away an appeal from the Christian Legal Society, which sued to get funding and recognition from the University of California's Hastings College of the Law.
The CLS requires that voting members sign a statement of faith and regards "unrepentant participation in or advocacy of a sexually immoral lifestyle" as being inconsistent with that faith.
But Hastings said no recognized campus groups may exclude people due to religious belief or sexual orientation.
The court upheld the lower court rulings saying the Christian group's First Amendment rights of association, free speech and free exercise were not violated by the college's decision.
The court also rejected a challenge to San Francisco's universal health care law from business groups upset that businesses are required to cover their workers or chip in towards city coverage. Many businesses have passed this fee along to its consumers. On my last visit to SF, there was a surcharge leveled on consumers as well, as the restaurant I visited (Dosa) noted at the bottom of the menu an additional fee on top of my bill. On the other hand, the program has covered 53,000 individuals and, according to the city, resulted in a 70% drop in emergency room visits at San Francisco General Hospital.
New York (FNS)-In an effort to help dispel concerns of racism, Terri Stocke, President of the Second Amendment March, agreed to coordinate with members of the Reverend Al Sharpton's National Action Network and the Reverend Jesse Jackson's Rainbow/Push Coalition in an effort to encourage more members of the Black community to bear arms and to carry them publicly.
In return, members of the Black community have agreed to flood the 2nd Amendment March, scheduled for April 19, 2010, in Washington, DC, with hundreds of thousands of heavily armed residents of Chicago's South Side and New York City's Harlem and Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhoods.
"We hope that the Black community understands that 2nd Amendment rights apply to all Americans" Ms. Stocke told the crowd outside Mr. Sharpton's offices.
I spent some time last night dissecting the transcript of Ford's NYTimes interview. One thing that has really come across to me is his obsession with vote ratings and trying to use them as proof that he really is a liberal Democrat.
Q. Let's talk about gay marriage. You know your record very well, but to quickly remind you, you voted to ban same sex marriage, with the Federal Marriage Amendment, twice.
A. I can say up until 2003, most organizations and national organization that had an office in Washington dedicated to fighting for equality for Americans, I enjoyed broad support and big support from them. The marriage votes drove my ratings down considerably, and arguably rightly so.
On choice:
No. 2, the National Right to Life Committee - I may be off by one or two points, I don't think I ever received higher than a 25 percent voting record. No. 3, they never gave me a penny. No. 4, my voting record in the 10 years in the Congress, was three or four years, was 100 percent.
I know somebody somewhat cynically suggested that perhaps there were not votes on abortion those years. But if that were true, the entire Congress would have gotten 100 percent.
On guns:
A: I never got an A rating, like my opponent - would-be opponent - has enjoyed. I don't own them. I do shoot them, and I shoot them at things that can't shoot back. And will continue to do that. And by that, I want to be clear, I don't mean children. I have done a little bird hunting in my day.
[...]
One of the reasons I never scored above a B with the N.R.A. - my intent was never to - it speaks to my independent-minded approach - I am a member of the N.R.A.
On immigration:
Before 2003-2004, my votes in the Congress, at least the grading by anti-immigrant advocacy groups, they gave me - one of them, the group FAIR - gave me a zero percent rating. In 2003-2004, Americans for Better Immigration, which is a great name for a group that wants to restrict immigration, rated me at 8 percent.
Aside from the fact that these are all serious distortions of his record (for more on that, you can go here, here, here and here), what is interesting to me is, again, Ford's belief that New York Democrats are stupid. I have yet to see a candidate wow primary voters with a bunch of vote ratings and use it to get past pandering, carpetbagging, misleading or lying about contributions, and so forth.
What is also interesting to me is whether vote ratings are worth anything at all. Take marriage equality, for example. While Ford trumpets good ratings for a number of years, what LGBT activists have focused on, rightly, is that he voted twice for the Federal Marriage Amendment- a serious misdeed. Take guns. He trumpets that he never got above a B from the NRA but what activists have focused on is his speech to the National Rifle Association. As a related example, some friends of mine with whom I had drinks the other night rightly mocked this study by Congressional Quarterly, finding that Obama has a 96.7% success rate in winning congressional votes on which he took a position. Why? Because Obama only took a position on battles he knew he would win, and did not fight at all on key issues like the public option. So the rating is a false depiction that he is a strong arm-twister, able to bend Congress to his will.
What all of this says to me is that all of these aggregate vote ratings are a lesser standard of judging a candidate's record than individual examples of merit. It's not just Ford who doesn't get that, it's lots of politicians, but Ford is trying to pull a fast one over on progressives and New York Democrats by throwing a bunch of numbers- many distorted- at us. No one should be fooled.
Despite their current minority status, it appears that Republicans can still govern D.C. through the National Rifle Association. Allow me explain how.
In August of 2008, right-wing infrastructure analyst Rob Stein warned progressives that even though Republicans were discredited, and headed to overwhelming electoral defeat, the conservative institutions backing the American right-wing were still intact. From a Democracy Alliance presentation (twenty-page PDF, page 2, emphasis mine):
I want to have one moment of reality checking though. The machinery that the right has built, the 400-million dollars a year of policy institutions, the 50-million dollars a year of leadership training organizations, the nearly a billion-dollars a year worth of very targeted media, the half a billion dollars a year of civic engagement- the NRA, and the Focus on the Family. This machinery, as depleted, as the leadership and the Republican brand is right this minute and it is their office holders are obviously discredited, as depleted as they are, this machinery is alive and well.
Stein's words are absolutely correct. Also, this passage includes some eye-popping numbers. Half a billion dollars for the NRA and Focus on the Family? These are amounts that dwarf any progressive political organization, with the possible exception of some of the larger labor unions.
Further, most of this money is actually the NRA. I once saw a chart related to Stein's famous Powerpoint presentation that listed the total funding of the various conservative issue advocacy organizations. Including most of the conservative groups that Stein describes as part of the right-wing's "policy institute consortium" and the "their mobilization arm," the NRA was about twice as large as any other group. Outside of the media realm, the NRA is by far the dominant conservative political institution.
Stein's warning has proved prophetic as, outside of the 60-vote rule in the Senate, the NRA is emerging as the right-wing's top weapon against progressive legislation. Earlier this year, Oklahoma Republican Senator Tom Coburn succeeded in attaching a concealed weapons amendment to the credit card legislation. Now, the D.C. Voting rights bill has been stalled indefinitely because the Senate attached a measure to the bill stripping current D.C. gun laws, and also preventing D.C. lawmakers from passing gun control legislation in the future.
So, while Republicans remain discredited and unpopular, their machinery is still able to prevent, or modify, progressive legislation from passing into law. Apropos, two people were shot at the D.C. Holocaust Museum today.
With this success, it is worth wondering what other legislation Republicans will attempt to kill via gun related amendments. The NRA is more than a single-issue advocacy group, it is the centerpiece of the entire right-wing policy infrastructure. Already, it is expanding into other areas beyond guns, working to block credit card reform and D.C. voting equality. Given that it still has a working majority in Congress, Republicans could theoretically use it to block, or at least modify, almost any legislation they wish.
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