Specter hits Sestak for favoring ... gun control

[ccharles000]

So it's come to this: In a bid for conservative and rural Pennsylvania Dems, Arlen Specter is now using targeted ads to attack Joe Sestak for getting an "F" rating from the National Rifle Association.

In a targeted way, Specter also seems to be touting his vote against the assault weapons ban -- a vote he took as a Republican. One wonders how this ad would play among urban Dems in Philadelphia -- if they ever were to hear about it.

Specter's assault on Sestak can be viewed in a Web ad on the site of the Washington Observer-Reporter, a paper in western Pennsylvania that presumably isn't widely read in Philly

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/plum-line/2010/05/specter_hits_sestak_for_favori.html

[villager]

1. My guns! My right to tell women they can't have abortions! Ackk!

Demagoguery in this country always boils down to the same things, over and over again...

[IndianaGreen]

2. Specter is the scumbag we loved to hate and loath

Putting a D after his name changed nothing!

[AlinPA]

3. I wish I could vote twice for Sestak. Specter is a republican using republican tactics. nt

[customerserviceguy]

4. As I heard on the radio this morning

Specter's doing all of the desperate stuff a candidate does when he's losing...

[old mark]

5. The "assault weapons ban" was a bullshit feel good law that accomplished nothing positive,

stopped no crimes, and simply raised the false image that the politicians were "doing something" about violent crime, The fact that Sestak supports re-introduction of this idiotic do nothing bill is not in his favor, and might cost him the general election in PA should he win on Tuesday. I have been waiting for someone to mention this - I'm really amazed it took so long.

mark

[boppers]

8. Ahem.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Assault_Weapons_Ban#Effect_on_crime

There's some disagreement about your assertions.

[benEzra]

10. Considering the Feinstein law increased, rather than decreased, AR/AK sales by a factor of 2 or 3,

didn't affect rifle magazine capacities, didn't ban any guns at all, and resulted in sharp increases in handgun sales (especially ones downsized for concealability), I'd say it's pretty obvious that the decline in the crime rate---that began *before* the non-ban was enacted---was due to other factors. Like, oh, the emphasis on community policing that began in the early '90s, the re-knitting of the social safety net, and an improving economy. There's also the pesky fact that rifle crime (and violent crime in general) has continued to decline since the 2004 expiration of the non-ban, even though AR's and other "black rifles" are now by far the most popular civilian rifles in the United States.

http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2008/data/table_20.html

FWIW, here's what the AWB did, and didn't, do (circled areas show differences between this ban-era AK and a pre-1994 or post-2004; that's my 2002 model SAR-1):



The 1994 Feinstein idiocy also helped Dems lose the House and Senate, and unseated the sitting Speaker of the House for the first time since the Civil War. Good trade, ya think?

Since 2006, the party is finally now getting out from under the albatross that was the "assault weapon" fraud and slowly shedding the "Dems'll-take-your-guns" meme. We don't need to resurrect that debacle, IMO.

[old mark]

11. There is a lot of nonsense about this - the "ban" did nothing to reduce the number

of refles in th US - it restricted the importation of guns with certain features, such as a bayonet lug, a pistol grip, a muzzle brake and a removable magazine. Importers soon grounbd off the bayonet lug, removed or changed the muzzle brake, changed the other features to comply and sold the same guns as "sporters". The
"pre-ban" guns are now highly prized - and expensive - collectables. The FBI report at the mid point of the "ban" was that rifle type weapons were used in maybve 1 to 2% of crime, a number that they considered "insignificant".

Remember, too - the guns most of you think of as "assault weapons" are copies of the originalvrifles made using some parts but with new made receivers so they can never be made to fire in full automatic mode. They are in effect toys for the American market. Among the very few actual weapons imported in original condition were the SKS rifles and the French MAS 49-56, neither of which fits the definition of "assault rifle".

Ahem - I have owned maybe a half dozen AK 47's, 8 SKS's, a FAL and an Egyptian Hakim rifle. They are really not the evil crime guns as seen on TV, and anyway, criminals do not worry about buying guns legally, so they?

Feel-good law, cheap politics.

mark

[X_Digger]

13. See the DOJ study below..

http://www.sas.upenn.edu/jerrylee/research/aw_final2004.pdf

Therefore, we cannot clearly credit the ban with any of the nation’s recent drop in gun violence. And, indeed, there has been no discernible reduction in the lethality and injuriousness of gun violence, based on indicators like the percentage of gun crimes resulting in death or the share of gunfire incidents resulting in injury, as we might have expected had the ban reduced crimes with both AWs and LCMs.
<snip>
The ban’s impact on gun violence is likely to be small at best, and perhaps too small for reliable measurement. AWs were used in no more than 8% of gun crimes even before the ban. Guns with LCMs are used in up to a quarter of gun crimes, but it is not clear how often the outcomes of gun attacks depend on the ability to fire more than 10 shots (the current limit on magazine capacity) without reloading.

*AW = "Assault Weapon", LCM = Large Capacity Magazine

From the same study:

[slackmaster]

16. A Wikipedia article that says the results are statistically inconclusive

Great source!

(If the AWB was effective at improving public safety, why has violent crime continued to fall even after its expiration?)

[boppers]

19. It says conflicting things.

That's why I love wikipedia, it doesn't whitewash information.

[saltpoint]

6. Arlen is now tanking big time on the predictions market. He is at

21 on Intrade this evening right now. He was at 32 yesterday, with Sestak at 75.

Sestak this evening is at 84-plus.

Rain in the forecast in many parts of Pennsylvania for tomorrow's primary.

I'm rooting for Joe.

[hollowdweller]

7. That is an issue that could work for Specter in that part of the country.

One of the reasons Obama had such a hard time in that area was his history of supporting gun control.

Even worse should Sestak win and not counter the anti gun argument it could give the race to the GOP.

The gun owners are one of the biggest grassroots groups in that area. I'd say they would even be more influential than labor.

Lets hope the gun issue once again does not doom another progressive candidate.

[marlakay]

9. I moved to the mountains 5 yrs ago and even dems here like guns

you have to realize for the rural folks its a big deal. I heard they even sold out of some ammunition because they were afraid of Obama. I am sure Fox had something to do with that.

No one could make it into office locally around here unless they were for guns.

But a senator has to work with the whole state which is filled up with city and country folks.

[polichick]

12. Gun clingers would never vote Dem here - and they usually do also...

...cling to their Bibles. As embarrassing as it was, Obama had that 100% correct.

[freddie mertz]

14. Arlen deserves to lose. I did my part this morning. nt.

[polichick]

15. I did too - and there were very few voters there at the time...

I hope Sestak voters are the ones most excited about getting out there on this rainy day.

[freddie mertz]

18. Well, I saw plenty of Sestak signs, and not a one for Arlen.

Plus, he was the talk of the small crowd there.

Maybe good signs, but we shall have to wait and see.

[greencharlie]

17. well... he just might be OUT :) nt