Jared Loughner was subdued only after his Glock was empty, and he had expended all 31 rounds the gun held with the extended clip and he was following Palin’s advice: “Don’t retreat! Reload!” Until 2004, Loughner would have had to reload after 11 shots, not 31, because extended magazines were forbidden under the assault weapons ban. Sadly, that ban was never renewed. The gun industry makes too much profit selling extreme weapons to extreme wing-nuts for their lobby, the NRA, to allow such a ban to continue. Of course, it was the Republican Party that killed the ban, and the person most responsible for that was Tom Delay.
If the Federal Assault Weapons Ban had been renewed in 2004, there’s a good chance that its restriction on high-capacity gun magazines would have prevented the Tuscon shooter from killing so many people. So who’s to blame for allowing this common sense law to lapse?
Certainly not the American public. During the 2004 debate on renewing the ban, the Annenberg Election Survey at the University of Pennsylvania released a poll showing that 68 percent of the public—including 57 percent of all gun owners and even 32 percent of all NRA members—wanted the ban extended.
Enacted in 1994 with the support of Ronald Reagan, the Assault Weapons Ban was politicized during the contentious 2004 presidential race. "I don’t understand the philosophy that says you’re making America safer when you take cops off the streets and put assault weapons back on them," John Kerry said at a rally in Missouri. Though Bush was chastised by Kerry for siding with "powerful friends in the gun lobby," he had claimed he’d sign the assault weapons ban extension if it crossed his desk.
Yet the bill never made it that far. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-TX) dismissed the ban as "a feel good piece of legislation" and flatly told the New York Times that it would expire even if Bush made an effort to renew it. "If the president asked me, it would still be no," he said. "He knows, because we don’t have the votes to pass the assault weapons ban. It will expire Monday, and that’s that."
His role in ending the ban made DeLay a hero among gun nuts, who printed up bumper stickers that said, "I’m for NRA and Tom DeLay." The NRA invited DeLay to keynote its annual meeting in 2005, just as ethics investigations were ramping up against him. He took the podium and choked up slightly as he proclaimed: "I’ve been in elected office for 26 years, and this is the highlight of my career."… [emphasis added]
Inserted from <Mother Jones>
I’m going to play Republican for a second and take a strict constructionist view of the Constitution. The founding fathers could not have intended the Second Amendment to include anything more advanced than single shot, muzzle loading firearms. Therefore those are the only firearms guaranteed under the Second Amendment. To be clear, I do not support such a position. As a former hunter in the days when I could do so, and as an NRA Sharpshooter with all nine bars in the days when the NRA was about gun safety and training, not lobbying for assault weapons, I favor responsible gun ownership. However, I also support common sense gun control laws including bans on weapons, ammunition and accessories not needed for hunting or sport shooting, closing the gun show loophole, and licensing that requires proof of the knowledge and practical ability to use guns safely, similar to what we require to drive a car.
In closing, guns are not responsible for the massacre, just as cars are not responsible for road rage. But that does not mean we should be lax in regulating their use.
10 Responses to “How Tom Delay Helped Enable the Arizona Massacre”
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Many good points made in your post.
Quibble: Hi-capacity magazines were prohibited for manufacture or new import nationally, Laws did not prohibit the sale or possession of hi-cap magazines that were existing, except certain states. I never noticed any shortages of rifle magazines of 10, 20 or more rounds (as I recall the national ban limited rifle magazines to 5 rds) or pistol magazines of over 20 rounds (national limit was 10 rds) right up through the early 2000’s. I think there was a loophole for “existing stocks or continuing contracts to import” or some such hoo-ha. All it did was create a market of high prices for purchase, but not high enough to actually diminish the prevalence of crowd-pleasers.
A valid discussion of AZ new gun laws might be appropriate. No permit required for concealed carry. Open carry has always been ok legally here (imo only anti-social dimwits would open carry to the local grocery), but a background check and x hours of accredited training were required to obtain a “must issue” concealed weapons permit. The triumph of the wacks was established in 09 and 10 by passage of laws OKing firearms in bars, and eliminating all restrictions on concealed carry. Check out the 2010 ballot measure that passed here in AZ that states the intent to “nullify” all federal laws regarding sporting use of firearms.
Oh, what fun!!
Mike
Welcome Mike! 🙂
Thanks for the clarification. I did not know that. From what I understand, Arizona’s gun laws are a wing-nut’s wet dream. When I lived in Phoenix many years ago, a couple of the bars I frequented had a check your hardware at the door policy. How do you stand it? I’m so glad I left in 1979. Their nullification regomen might have a rough time getting through the Ninth.
DeLay and Bush didn’t want to upset their buddy Ted Nugent! 😆
Now he could be Palin’s squeeze.
I”m a gun owner myself TC and I see no reasonable gun control measures that you have not mentioned here.
I’m not sure I understand what you mean Lisa. Are you saying that the ones I suggest are reasonable, but no others are?
Let the people have their guns… and 20 year mandatory, no parole incarceration for use of them in a crime. A year or two of this, which nobody can really argue with, and our gun problem would be cut in half.
Welcome Tom. 🙂
Many states already have a mandatory minimum for gun crimes. In Oregon, merely brandishing a weapon in a threatening way carries a 7 1/2 year sentence. The big problem with your argument is that psychopaths and sociopaths lack the cognitive skills necessary for consequential thinking. If they even think about the consequences at all, they don’t care.
Let’s not lose our heads in the emotion of what is truly a tragedy.
Since a standing army was prohibited by the Constitution –because the kings had a tendency to use it against the people– I always thought that the purpose of second ammendment was:
1) to ensure that any invasion of the country or its states, would be capable of meeting force with force.
2) prevent a strong central government from stepping on the rights of an un-armed populace.
In both case, you would want those possessing arms to have the best or at least equal levels of armament with those they would oppose.
Will any of the proposed new ‘gun laws’ stipulate that where these laws are enforced, police or government officials may not use these items either? If they (the laws) are said to be truly effective, then, they would have no legitimate use for them either.
If the government limits the type of guns/equipment the people can possess, such that a population ‘standing up’ to an abusive, out-of-control central government–becomes easy prey to a professional army/national guard, then we have allowed the trojan horse to enter into our land, .. and deserve what has always followed when the people of a nation has been dis-armed.
Trebor, you’re only wrong on two out of two, but that’s because your premise is based on Republican propaganda. The Constitution does NOT forbid a standing army. The stayed purpose of the Second Amendment is to provide for a militia. In those days, militias exited to supplement the standing army with forces for local defense. Your second point has no historical basis.