From My Cold, Dead Hands!

Will someone explain to me why these idiots always target the inanimate object, but not the real reasons for all this carnage??

Mostly, a miss on gun control
The Pa. House turned aside most proposals. One lawmaker called the urban initiatives "liberal gun-grabbing legislation."
By Mario F. Cattabiani and Amy Worden
Inquirer Staff Writers

HARRISBURG - The state House, dominated by members from rural areas where hunting is a way of life and the Second Amendment is sacrosanct, resoundingly rejected a series of gun-control measures yesterday, including one that would have allowed Philadelphia to enact its own firearms laws.

Representatives ended the second day of a special informal session on anticrime bills yesterday afternoon without considering the most controversial proposal: to limit handgun purchases statewide to one a month.

That idea likely will come to a vote when the session - convened as a way to gauge support for gun-control legislation through a series of straw votes - is scheduled to reconvene Tuesday. In the end, whatever was approved yesterday will have to be reconsidered in the formal legislative process later.

(snip)

Before the session ended, members voted down an Evans bill that would have allowed Philadelphia and other cities to enact their own gun-control ordinances, stiffer than state law.

During its last special session on crime, in 1995, the legislature stripped Philadelphia of its power to enact firearms laws. (Because the State Supreme Court had to remind the Democratic Peoples' Republic of Philadelphia that they are, in fact, just another of the 67 counties in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania!)

(snip)

As the House was considering a bill prohibiting ammunition sales in Philadelphia to anyone who doesn't own a gun legally, Rep. Daryl D. Metcalfe, the chamber's leading gun-rights supporter, blamed the welfare system and the breakdown of the family for causing crime in the city.

He also predicted that any measure limiting the Second Amendment right to bear arms would be defeated.

"Liberal gun-grabbing legislation is going to go down here," said Metcalfe (R., Butler). "... And I'm going to continue to stand with some of my colleagues and reference those hundreds of thousands of Second Amendment supporters that want the gun-grabbing legislation to go down."

Those comments set off Evans and other Philadelphia Democrats.

"Nobody is immune to violence. Nobody in this room," he said. "Don't you understand that because we sit in this isolated place with all kinds of security around, all kinds of guards around, don't you understand that you can walk out here and anybody can be capped?"

Rep. James R. Roebuck Jr. (D., Phila.) shouted, "Philadelphia is not the center of evil as some of you suggest... . Tell me how to save the children. Don't just tell me to keep things as they are."

The TrekMedic fumes:

It seems to the TrekMedic that both Governor Rendell, and soon-to-be Governor Lynn Swann have BOTH proposed budget increases for more police officers. The TrekMedic remembers a time in Philadelphia when one could drive through various neighborhoods and not go more than a quarter-mile without crossing paths with a police patrol unit! Where are they now? Oh, yeah,..that part of the city budget is now going to clothe and feed these knuckle-dragging miscreants!