The Illinois State Rifle Association just posted this on their Facebook page.
The bill failed to garner the necessary 71 votes, (65 Yea) and has been placed on postponed consideration. That means the bill is still active and is not dead.
I guess the good news is that it isn’t dead. Still it would be nice to see Illinois join Free State status.
UPDATE: Thirdpower at Days of our Trailers has more on what went on today here. Also read the comments on the bill below from Randian and David Lawson.
Now that Mayor Richard M. Daley is leaving office he wants to keep a few perks of the office. Namely, he wants to keep at least three (and preferrably five) of his Chicago Police Department bodyguards to protect him in retirement. It is also reported by Sun-Times columnist Michael Sneed that Daley is requesting two cars to be put at his disposal – one for him and one for his wife.
The head of the local Fraternal Order of Police took issue with Daley’s request for these bodyguards. It should be noted that the Chicago PD is now over 2,300 officers short of its authorized strength.
The head of the police union called the mayor’s request for bodyguards after he leaves office ill-timed and “ridiculously excessive.”
“It’s another example of excessive use of manpower and resources during an extreme shortage,” said Michael Shields, president of the Fraternal Order of Police.
Daley, as might be expected, disagreed and said his request was “appropriate”. His predecessor, Harold Washington, died in office and Washington’s predecessor, Jane Byrne, wasn’t given a bodyguard when she left office. I guess appropriate is in the eye of the beholder.
I’d normally suggest that if Mayor Daley is concerned for his safety and that of his family then he should apply for a concealed carry permit. However, due to the efforts of Mr. Daley and his Chicago Democratic Machine, the State of Illinois still doesn’t have concealed carry. And if Governor Pat Quinn – another politician from the Chicago Democratic Machine – is true to this word, HB 148 will be vetoed even if it does pass the Illinois House and Senate.
Life can be tough out in the real world. Daley’s efforts to keep the people of Chicago and the State of Illinois unarmed and defenseless are now coming back to bite him. As they say, payback is a bitch.
With HB 148 – the Illinois right-to-carry bill – probably coming up for a vote today, I thought it would be interesting to contrast the divergent viewpoints on the issue from Chicago and Southern Illinois newspapers.
The Chicago Tribune ran an editorial on Wednesday entitled “Street Heat? Say No”. The editorial does acknowledge that Illinois is an outlier when it comes to concealed carry but then goes on to say “Outlier or not, we still think it would be a mistake to encourage people to walk around with guns.”
The Tribune editorial glosses over the research that shows crime rates decline or, at the very least, do not go up when concealed carry laws are implemented.
Bottom line: Concealed-carry laws don’t seem to have a significant impact on violence one way or the other. The odds aren’t much greater that you’re going to wind up successfully defending yourself with a gun on the street, or that you’re going to mistakenly or intentionally plug somebody with a bullet. There are cases, though, where licensed holders do commit violence.
They claim the HB 148’s authors recognize the potential for “mayhem” by restricting where concealed carry would be allowed under the bill. They then go on to attack all the places where concealed carry would be allowed.
Finally, despite being endorsed by the Illinois Sheriffs Association and the Illinois Association of Chiefs of Police along with organizations for the Chicago PD’s sergeants and lieutenants, the editorial claims CCW raises public safety concerns for local cops. I believe that by this they mean the hierarchy of the Chicago Police Department and no one else. They conclude their editorial opposing CCW by saying:
We see more problems here. The background check procedures for issuing a state firearm owner’s identification card are not foolproof. The state lacks enough control over the private sale of guns.
This bill needs an extraordinary majority to pre-empt local authority and to survive a veto from the governor. We urge lawmakers to reject it. The safety and well-being of the people of Illinois doesn’t start with the power to pack heat on the street.
In stark contrast to this fear-mongering editorial from the Chicago Tribune is an editorial in today’s Belleville News-Democrat. They take strong exception to Governor Pat Quinn playing the “fear card” when he says concealed carry will “to more danger and more bad things happening.”
That line might work if Illinois were the first state to consider concealed carry. But 48 of the 50 states already have concealed carry, with no horrible impact on public safety. That’s because the people who apply for a concealed-carry permits and are willing to undergo the required background checks and training are not the people out robbing and killing. They want this law to enhance public safety, not hurt it.
Whether HB 148 would improve safety is a matter for debate, but it’s safe to say that passage of the bill would not make Illinois a more dangerous place.
While stopping short of endorsing the bill, the editorial recognizes that CCW will not make Illinois like the so-called Wild West and that criminals are already carrying concealed. It is interesting to note of the nine comments on this editorial, eight support concealed carry and only one opposes it.
I have embedded an excerpt from Senator Grassley’s questioning of Attorney General Eric Holder at yesterday’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearings. It omits the portions not dealing with Operation Fast and Furious (aka Project Gunwalker).
At the Senate Judiciary Committee oversight hearings on the Department of Justice yesterday, Senator Chuck Grassley read a prepared statement. I have omitted the parts not dealing with ATF and Operation Gunrunner.
Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding today’s oversight hearing. It has been over a year since this committee last held an oversight hearing with the Attorney General so there is much ground to cover. In that intervening year, many developments at the Justice Department have raised serious questions about whether the department is putting politics before the interest of the American people. These are serious issues and I plan to ask a number of questions about why the department has applied the law inconsistently in certain areas, such as prosecuting national security leaks, and whether the department has provided apparently false information in response to congressional inquiries.
ATF Investigation:
I am extremely disappointed in the Justice Department’s response to my inquiry into the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF). I sent a letter to the ATF on January 27, 2011, seeking a response to allegations I received from whistleblowers that the ATF was allowing guns to be illegally smuggled to Mexico. Rather than allowing the ATF to respond to my letter, on February 4, 2011, I received a letter from the department which claimed the whistleblower allegations were “false” and that “ATF makes every effort to interdict weapons that have been purchased illegally and prevent their transportation to Mexico.” I personally expressed my concern to the Attorney General about the accuracy of the department’s replies to my inquiries in our telephone conversation on Monday, May 2.
I was stunned that just a few hours after our conversation, the department sent another letter repeating the denial in slightly different words. According to Monday’s letter, “ATF’s Operation Fast and Furious did not knowingly permit straw buyers to take guns into Mexico.” It is particularly disturbing that the department would renew its denial at this late date in light of the growing evidence that the department’s claims are patently false.
Documents and witness testimony from employees at ATF show that the ATF knowingly allowed the sale of semi-automatic weapons to many straw purchasers, even after the ATF knew that guns they previously purchased were recovered in Mexico. I have in my possession a document which the ATF specifically requested be drawn up on March 29 of this year, apparently in response to this controversy. This document shows that just 15 defendants indicted on January 25 were responsible for purchasing one thousand, three hundred and eighteen (1,318) guns from Arizona dealers after being identified as targets in the ATF’s Operation Fast and Furious investigation. Of those guns, only 250 have been recovered in the United States. And that’s just from these fifteen straw buyers—the ATF enabled this pattern to recur many more times through additional buyers and guns. At the very least, this means that over 1,000 semi-automatic weapons are on the street because the ATF decided to wait and watch rather than getting in the way of the criminals’ plans.
The ATF also clearly knew that these guns were being exported south of the border to Mexico. According to internal ATF correspondence, as of June 15, 2010, the ATF was aware that at least 179 guns—traced back to sales which the ATF allowed to occur—had been recovered in crimes in Mexico.
While it appears that the ATF did make an effort to tally the number of the guns they allowed to walk, the reality is that those recovered represent just a small percentage of the total number of these guns the ATF has lost track of. Worst of all, on December 15, 2010, Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed in an incident at the border where two of these weapons that the ATF knowingly allowed to be sold to criminals were found at the crime scene. At best, the ATF was careless in authorizing the sale of thousands of guns to straw purchasers; at worst our own government knowingly participated in arming criminals, drug cartels, and those who later killed federal agents.
Aside from categorical denials that are clearly contradicted by the evidence, I have received absolutely zero substantive information from the department on this issue. On the contrary, the Department of Justice has intervened in every inquiry I have made with other agencies under the department and instructed them that the Justice Department alone is allowed to respond. The actions of the Department have only served to impede and frustrate this investigation. In fact, I have provided more information to the Attorney General than he has provided to me.
After ten letters to the department or the ATF, I have received five responses—two which provided false information, one which provided no information, one which sought to deter me from seeking information from other sources, and one which partially responded to my concern about attempts to prevent communications between whistleblowers and Congress.
Although the ATF is a separate entity, it has done these things under the Attorney General’s watch. The witnesses that were interviewed under subpoenas from the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee have made clear that Acting Director Melson was intimately involved in Operation Fast and Furious, lauding it as an extremely successful operation. However, even more troubling is that it is clear that individuals at the Justice Department were involved in certain aspects of Operation Fast and Furious.
The evidence that I and Congressman Issa have gathered is clear—the ATF sanctioned the sale of guns to straw purchasers that were then used in crimes on both sides of the Southwest border. Officials at both the Department and ATF knew of and approved the operation. Now, the Attorney General argues that this congressional investigation threatens the ongoing criminal prosecution of the straw purchasers. Yet, the department and the ATF chose to wait and watch those same straw purchasers do business for over a year before charging them with any of the criminal conduct. It was only after the death of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry that the straw purchasers were finally charged. I take exception to the notion that Congress must hold off on an investigation on the grounds that discovering the truth could hinder prosecutions. The goal of a trial is a search for the truth. The department is required to turn over any exculpatory evidence to criminal defense attorneys in any event. If our system of justice works the way it should, then the department cannot ultimately prevent the truth from coming to light. Congress should not allow its fact finding efforts to be stonewalled just because the details might be embarrassing to certain officials in the Justice Department.
Further, the department has tried to avoid questions by referring to the Acting Inspector General’s investigation. That inquiry does not preclude an independent congressional investigation. Moreover, it has become clear that conduct by attorneys at the U.S. Attorney’s office has been called into question. As you know, that is a matter that the Inspector General is statutorily precluded from investigating. So, unless the Attorney General has requested an independent review by the department’s Office of Professional Responsibility, the questionable conduct by department attorneys may go unchecked.
The conduct in question by both the ATF and the department is serious. It may have led to the death of at least one federal agent and countless other crimes in the U.S. and Mexico. The department should not stonewall Congress or seek to intimidate whistleblowers or other potential witnesses in congressional proceedings. This cannot simply be swept under the rug. I plan to continue my work with the help of Congressman Issa and get to the bottom of who signed off on this operation that failed so tragically.
I would also note that in the video from the hearings that I have seen of Attorney General Eric Holder testifying you will see over his left shoulder Asst. AG Ron Weich. Weich is the one who has continually sent the kiss-off letters to Senator Grassley.
Andrew at the Vuurwapen Blog has just posted a new video which he calls “La Longue Carabine” in honor of Natty Bumpo from Last of the Mohicans. In this video he discusses two of his 20-inch barrel AR-15’s with collapsible stocks. He notes that the length may not look cool but it is very easy to shoot and helps reduce recoil. I might add that U.S. Marines used a similar length M-16A2 in close quarters combat in Iraq quite effectively.
Sen. Chuck Grassley was interviewed on his questioning of Attorney General Eric Holder by Ginny Simone of NRA News.
The CCRKBA and Alan Gottlieb say if Eric Holder was so clueless about what was going on in the DOJ, it is time for him to go home and write his memoirs.
IF HOLDER IS SO IGNORANT ABOUT GUNRUNNER SCANDAL, HE SHOULD RESIGN
BELLEVUE, WA – Following a second day of Capitol Hill hearings in which he professed little or no knowledge about the controversial Project Gunrunner, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms today called for the resignation of Attorney General Eric Holder.
“For the second day in a row, Attorney General Holder has stated on the record that he didn’t know about one of the most egregious government scandals in memory,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. “This country cannot afford the luxury of having its top law enforcement officer confess ignorance of an operation that may have allowed thousands of guns to be illegally exported to Mexico. This operation happened on his watch, and apparently right under his nose, and apparently cost the life of at least one law enforcement officer.”
Gottlieb called it an “outrage” that Holder has been unable to answer critical questions about the bungled operation, conducted by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. ATF whistleblowers have told Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA) and Congressman Darrell Issa (R-CA) that Project Gunrunner, and its off-shoot, Operation Fast and Furious, apparently funneled nearly 2,000 guns into the illicit gun trafficking pipeline to Mexican drug cartels.
“It is simply unbelievable that the attorney general can act as though he never heard of an operation that has been exposed on national television by CBS News,” Gottlieb stated. “How could he not know, almost six months after the slaying of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry, that guns recovered at the scene are linked directly to the Gunrunner sting?”
“Holder is either monumentally stupid,” he added, “or he is telling a monumental lie. Either way, it is obvious that Holder is either hiding something or he is hiding from something. For the attorney general to not know about Gunrunner and its direct link to the Terry slaying is a sign of gross incompetence.”
“It’s time for Eric Holder to go home and write his memoirs,” Gottlieb said.
Miguel at Gun Free Zone has been a naughty boy…..and I can’t stop laughing!
Go here to see why.
It is amazing the things you can do with Adobe Photoshop!
Rep. Darrell Issa released three documents today. One document is a wiretap authorized by Asst. Attorney General Lanny Breuer in Operation Fast and Furious. The wiretap was authorized in early 2010.
Here are links to stories on it by Sharyl Attkisson of CBS News and Matthew Boyle in The Daily Caller. I am heading out the door to a meeting and will post more later this evening.
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