What Mayor Bill Haslam Will Be Up To
Mayors against guns will have a meeting:
A coalition of mayors meets Thursday in Chicago to exchange strategies for fighting illegal guns and for winning tougher state and federal gun laws.
But, remember, Mr. Haslam just wants to deal with illegal guns. Apparently, the wants to do that by making more guns illegal:
Mayors say they struggle to stem the flow of guns from states with lax gun laws.
Mr. Haslam, that’d be Tennessee they’re talking about there. More:
The city officials meeting today will discuss strategies to get guns off the street:
•In Milwaukee, Barrett met in May with a local gun dealer whose shop sold more guns used in crimes than any other dealer in the USA, according to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF). The dealer, Badger Outdoors in West Milwaukee, agreed to install security cameras and ban the use of cellphones (so that “straw buyers,” purchasing guns for people who can’t pass background checks, can’t communicate with those they are buying for.)
•In Trenton, police set up checkpoints to search cars for illegal guns. Of 375 guns confiscated last year, Palmer says, half came from Pennsylvania, where laws are less restrictive than in New Jersey.
•New York City sued 15 gun dealers in Georgia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and Virginia in May for allowing straw purchases. Private investigators hired by the city posed as gun buyers and wore hidden cameras.
And recall that Bloomberg’s sting:
•His agents likely broke the law by lying on ATF Form 4473
•Jeopardized existing investigations
•And the ATF is investigating the sting
Are these the kinds of things you want in Knoxville, Mr. Mayor? Random roadblocks looking for illegal guns and suing dealers?
The NRA: “You can have press conferences all day,” says Wayne LaPierre, NRA executive vice president. “Until you provide 100% enforcement of the existing laws, (criminals are) going to laugh at you, and … go about their business.”
Update: More from the NYT:
What Mayor Bloomberg consistently wants to do is impose New York City-style gun laws on the rest of America.
October 26th, 2006 at 12:00 pm
Checkpoints to search for illegal guns? Scary.
October 27th, 2006 at 9:41 am
Does Haslam read the fine print on anything? His executive style is puzzling. Does this mean that the other members of his management team agree? I wonder what Bill Lyons or Dave Hill think about this decision.
Let’s review. Ragsdale cannot run for governor because of his Watergate type fiasco. Now Haslam cannot run for governor because of his gun confiscation platform.
These are the best and the brightest politicians Knox County has?
October 27th, 2006 at 9:43 am
#9, not the best and brightest. Just wealthy and connected.