Northern Colorado Gazette

by Craig Masters

RMGO instructed journalists "no face photos" to protect teachers privacy

Every trial attorney knows how important the art of questioning is to getting the answers they want the jury to hear. It is the height of gamesmanship in the court room. An example is the popular question: “Mr Witness, have you quit beating your wife”? If Mr. Witness never beat his wife, how does he answer? If he says, “Yes” he is accused of having beaten his wife sometime in the past. If he says, “No,” it would seem he is admitting to beating his wife.

And so it was exactly such a word game the chairman of the committee hearing testimony on gun control, Senator Patrick Leahy, was playing with National Rifle Association CEO, Wayne LaPierre, this week when the senator stated for the record that he was, “not playing games up here.” Shame on Senator Leahy for making that point clear to all of those educationally challenged mainstream media viewers who will see the sound bite and never learn that “playing games” was exactly what you were doing.

Senator Leahy is the current president pro tempore of the senate and therefore is third in the line of succession to become President of the United States.

Ironically, Leahy represents Vermont, a state that consistently ranks among the the states with the lowest crime rates in America and is the only state with absolutely no government restrictions on law-abiding citizens’ right to carry handguns; no permits are required to carry concealed or openly displayed handguns in Leahy’s home state!

But Leahy hasn’t really lived in Vermont among the gun-toters since he was sent to Washington in 1975. He is the ultimate Washington insider. As he pressed his anti-gun agenda in his questioning of LaPierre, it would have appeared he doesn’t even realize his own state of record has the fewest gun laws of any state in the union while being about the safest place to live in the Western Hemisphere.

Obama has stressed that he wants to strengthen the central government’s ability to keep guns out of the hands of the “mentally ill.” But among those executive orders he ceremoniously signed in his recent exhibition for television he didn’t even mention that 23 states refuse to share mental health records for the purpose of background checks for gun purchases. And he didn’t address this issue in his executive orders signing circus.

Wayne LaPierrre was able to point out to his opponent in the game Leahy was ‘not’ playing, is that of the nearly 76,000 criminal attempts to purchase guns the central government’s InstaCheck system has caught, the government only cared enough to prosecute 44 of those criminals. LaPierre was able to make it clear that the laws on the books aren’t being enforced by the very government Leahy claims deserves to have more laws to enforce!

“Too many children. We must do something,” said Gabby Giffords.

But the fellow who shot Giffords was able to buy his handgun in spite of having 2 arrests for drug possession, and having been recently suspended from a public college until he underwent a mental health evaluation. Another perfect example of government unable to do even the most basic job competently.

Side bar: Did you know that the morning of the Giffords shootings, the shooter was prohibited from purchasing additional ammunition by a Wal-Mart employee? The guy behind the Wal-Mart sporting goods counter probably risked his job by refusing to sell to a customer because he simply didn’t like the way the customer was acting and the way he was dressed. Kudos to that guy.

About the safety of those children: On the evening of the 28th of January, 300 school employees, from teachers to bus drivers, crowded into a room in Broomfield to complete their required training to obtain a permit to carry a concealed handgun. The Rocky Mountain Gun Owners organization assembled an all-star staff including Weld County District Attorney Ken Buck and Chief Deputy District Attorney Rob Miller for a class offered exclusively to school employees. These people understand that disarming those who are most likely to be caught in the line of fire between a mass murderer and the children in their charge is the best way to insure the greatest number of kids will be killed. These people have figured it out. They understand that huddling together in a corner just makes a bigger target for a shooter that probably wouldn’t even be able to hit a fast moving target the size of a kindergartener. Unlike those in that little group of protesters in Denver who gathered to prevent Senate bill 9 from being debated openly, these hundreds of concerned school employees were actually doing something to prepare to protect the children and stop the next school shooter. I was there, I saw the standing room only crowd and heard them applaud the RMGO staff for a presentation well done.

Side bar: The 74 year old retired colonel who wrestled the Giffords shooter to the ground allowing others to pile on, had already been shot! He was hit in the initial spray of bullets. He survived, and who knows how many others are alive today because – after being shot – he attacked the shooter, he didn’t just try to be a human shield for others or hit the ground and hope for the best. And he was not alone. Someone else hit the shooter with a folding chair. That person was injury #14, according to the records of the day.

Duck and Cover is a good defense against approaching tornados, not shooters!

Disarming America will never protect the children – it will only insure that they will be forced into slavery to pay for the central government and the lavish lifestyle being so obviously demonstrated by the lavish vacations of the Obamas and the rest of the Washington elitists.

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