Beware of what the Democrats are saying about guns in their party platform, a Second Amendment group says.
The draft 2008 Democratic National Platform includes the “Utopian fantasy that gun control laws will somehow make neighborhoods safer,” said the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms.
“While promising to preserve our Second Amendment rights, the party platform demonizes semiautomatic sport utility rifles and wants them banned, calls for anti-gun show legislation and proposes so-called ‘common-sense’ gun laws,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb.
“Boiled down, all it really means is that the Democrats are still the party of gun control no matter how they try to re-package the rhetoric.”
The Draft 2008 Democratic National Platform includes the following single paragraph on firearms:
We recognize that the right to bear arms is an important part of the American tradition, and we will preserve Americans’ continued Second Amendment right to own and use firearms. We believe that the right to own firearms is subject to reasonable regulation, but we know that what works in Chicago may not work in Cheyenne. We can work together to enact and enforce common-sense laws and improvements, like closing the gun show loophole, improving our background check system and reinstating the assault weapons ban, so that guns do not fall into the hands of terrorists or criminals. Acting responsibly and with respect for differing views on this issue, we can both protect the constitutional right to bear arms and keep our communities and our children safe.
In their party platform, Democrats are “shamelessly telling American gun owners that they embrace the rights of millions of shooters, hunters and gun collectors,” but that isn’t true, Gottlieb said.
Democrats believe most gun bans are “common sense.” In their platform, they are calling for a ban on so-called “assault weapons,” and they want to “regulate gun shows out of business.”
Gottlieb says the semi-automatic weapons ban signed into law by then-President Bill Clinton “accomplished nothing” except to cost Democrats control of Congress in 1994.
And he noted that a study done for the Justice Department found that gun shows are rarely the source of firearms used by criminals.
“As Democrats descend on Denver to nominate a candidate who is on record in opposition to sensible concealed carry laws, we encourage gun owners across the country, and especially in Colorado, to remind the party that the Supreme Court in June held that gun bans are unconstitutional.
“Democrats have an opportunity to reject and repudiate this platform,” Gottlieb concluded. “If they do not, that tells American gun owners everything they need to know about Democrats as November approaches.”
