Politics – Page 406 – Shall Not Be Questioned

Centers of Gravity

Rightwingprof brought up the issue of urbanization and how it affects Pennsylvania in one of the comments. I thought I’d expand on the issue a bit in terms of how it relates to gun policy in the commonwealth.

According to the Center for Rural Pennsylvania:

2.8 million Pennsylvanians live in rural municipalities, or 24% of the population
64% of municipalities in Pennsylvania are rural.

No doubt that Pennsylvania is already heavy urbanized and suburbanized, but we’ve still maintained pro-gun policies. There is a reason for this.
The political center of gravity of the gun control movement in Pennsylvania is unquestionably Philadelphia. There might be some sympathies for it in some of the other cities, but in any movement you have to worry about it’s center of gravity. Pittsburgh is Pennsylvania’s other big city, and tends not to be as solidly anti-gun. The suburbs of Philadelphia have never been, and still aren’t solidly anti-gun. There are a lot of pro-gun legislators in the suburban districts, and even a few in Philadelphia.

The real danger is rooted in the suburbs going Democratic and becoming more solidly anti-gun, and following the lead of the city. My district recently switched from a pro-gun Republican to a pro-gun Democrat, so we’re safe in that vain, but I also live in the most pro-gun suburban county.

One of the things that really worries me is Delaware County, which is where I grew up. My state legislator there, Tom Gannon, was a long time NRA A rated politician. This past election year he was pushing an anti-gun bill. Granted it was less onerous than a lot of other measures pushed, but it still had the potential to penalize honest gun owners. He still lost his seat to an anti-gun Democrat. Delaware County is traditionally solidly Republican, but that’s changing, and it’s the fifth most populous county in the commonwealth. Reasonably pro-gun Curt Weldon, who represented most of Delaware County and some of Chester County, was also defeated by rabidly anti-gun Joe Sestak.

Is our state making the slow march toward being an anti-gun state? It all depends on whether the anti-gun movement’s center of gravity can grow to encompass the suburban counties. Pennsylvania has 12.3 million residents, and Philadelphia and the suburban counties contain 3.85 million of those, which would be a formidable force in state politics if they all voted in a single block.

Philadelphia has been losing population rather rapidly though, but they are moving to the suburbs, and continuing to vote like Philadelphians. For at least the next decade, our gun rights are safe. Beyond that, I wouldn’t want to place any bets.

Bat Control

It looks as if baseball bat control could be coming to the Keystone State.

Protecting kids from injury is the top priority, said Carroll, who represents Luzerne and Monroe counties and is an assistant coach on his son’s Little League team.

Of course, it’s for the Children.Â I’m glad to see that all the other problems in our state have been dealt with, that our legislators can now feel free to turn their attention to the menace of aluminum baseball bats.Â I played with aluminum bats when I was a kid.Â I also didn’t always wear a helmet!Â I got beamed with a ball once too. Â Some would say this explains a lot.

The Representative who is sponsoring this legislation’s name is Mike Carroll, and he’s a freshman Democrat from the Wilkes-Barre area, out to show the world how much he cares, apparently. Â He can be contacted here if you’d like to tell him what you think about this ~~steaming~~ piece of ~~crap~~ legislation.

What Gets Me Worried About Pennsylvania

This article explains the struggle for the GOP to maintain it’s traditional dominance of the Philadelphia suburbs.Â No single political party has clearly wielded total power in the state over any length of time.Â I think this has been healthy for our politics in general.

The consequences of this are enormous for the balance of power in state politics. For decades, support from these suburban Philadelphia counties has been crucial for GOP success statewide. To control the state, Republicans needed the suburbs. But beginning in the 1990s, the suburbs began to tilt toward the Democrats in some very important elections.

This erosion in GOP support can be traced across presidential, statewide, and congressional elections.

I worry very much about Pennsylvania turning into a single party run state like New Jersey, New York, or Massachusetts.Â I am not pleased with the political climate in any of those states, and corruption is a more serious problem when a single party has total control over political institutions.

This, quite honestly, is the fault of the Republicans themselves.Â Pennsylvania suburbanites voted Republican because of fiscal issues.Â We’re not a markedly socially conservative area. Â With the GOP having all but abandoned any sense of fiscal discipline or smaller government, it’s leaving GOP supporters in the area hard pressed to find reasons to keep affiliating.Â Â I myself used to be a Republican until the national party pissed me off with their crap.Â They have yet to do anything of substance to bring me back into the fold.Â I have been willing to punish the party for by voting for some Democrats in certain races, and I will continue to do so.

But if the Philadelphia Suburbs start voting in lock step with the city, I’ll move to Texas or Arizona faster than you can blink.Â I have no desire to leave Pennsylvania, but I won’t live in a state run by Democrats.Â I’ve seen our neighbors go that route, and it doesn’t end with happy results.

Readshaw Bill Passes

The Pennsylvania General Assembly has passed the Readshaw bill unanimously. This extends liability protection for land owners who open their land for public hunting.

“For decades, the Recreational Use of Land and Water Act stood to protect landowners who agree to open their land to hunters,” Roe said. “However, a recent civil case in Lehigh County, demonstrated that there was a need to strengthen the law, thereby continuing to provide liability protection for landowners who generously open their lands to hunters.

“With House approval of Rep. Readshaw’s bill, we now look forward to working with the Senate to advance this measure to Governor Edward G. Rendell’s desk in a timely manner.”

I expect Rendell will sign this. Even if he doesn’t, unanimous is a veto proof majority. Pennsylvania has always protected land owners from liability for opening their land to hunters, but a recent case in Lehigh County, in which a judge ruled a property owner partially liable for an injury to a woman a half-mile away from a hunterâ€™s stray bullet. It’s good to see it pass unanimously, which is quite a feat. I’m sure the senate will quickly pass it.

Philadelphia’s Italian Bees

Classical Values has something on Philadelphia’s bee problem.

Rudy OK With Concealed Guns?

Looks like Rudy is now okay with concealed weapons.Â You know, this issue really just doesn’t work for him.Â Â I’m not sure he can really reconcile himself with his record here.Â The harder he tries, the less I’m buying it.

He’s NutRageous

John Lott reminds us that Michael Moore is completely nuts.Â Or is that NutRageous?Â Watch the Video.

I am often a critic of police tactics, particularly the use of military tactics, but Moore’s video here is insulting and demeaning, and trivializes the difficult job they have to do in discerningÂ whether or not deadly force is justified.Â Moore also misrepresents what the law is in this matter.

Everyone should check out, if you already haven’t already seen the video that was linked by Crime and Federalism last year.Â It involves a police shooting a man with a cell phone, much like the one Moore was using as a prop in his video.Â I would challenge anyone to say the police officers in this case were not justified in their actions.Â Also see the frame by frame analysis of the situation.

Moore is a buffoon, and the fact that he’s a hero of the far left is a big reason I can’t take them seriously. Â Given some real abuses out there in law enforcement tactics, one that have killed numerous innocent people, Moore chooses simply to mock officers and play the race card.Â The issue of race in law enforcement is a serious one, and by approaching it in this manner, Moore is simply making a fool of himself. Â It’s certainly not the first time though.

Legislature Pushing Back

Dave Hardy has some links to the goings on in Pennsylvania right now.

I have written my state representative about the recent antics of the Governor. I think this is actually kind of foolish on Rendell’s part. This is is surprising to me, because I’ve always thought, despite my disagreements with the Governor, he was a rather shrewed politician with a good political sense.

Despite his lame duck status, he’s the primary mouthpiece for the Democratic Party in the state. He’s just been handed a stunning political defeat with voters overwhelmingly rejecting the Act 1 tax shift, and now, with the Democratic Party holding onto a single seat majority in the General Assembly, he’s pushing hard for gun control.

A lot of those new Democrats are from districts where the voters will eat them alive if they perceive them as pushing gun control. Even if the reps themselves are pro-gun, which is the case for many of them, they are still unknown quantities to voters, and Rendell’s rhetoric here isn’t going to do anything but hurt them.

Ed Rendell Harping on Gun Control

I guess Ed is a little pissed off after voters handed him a stunning defeat over the Act 1 tax shift proposal. He’s scolding the legislature over it’s refusal to pass gun control laws.

Gov. Ed Rendell today bashed the General Assembly for failing to pass gun control laws. “This Legislature, for too long, has been in control of the NRA,” Rendell said at a news conference with mayors from cities across the state and lawmakers pushing bills such as limiting handgun sales to one a month.

The Legislature for decades has resisted significantly tightening gun laws.

Asked for evidence of his statement that the Legislature has been under the “control” of the National Rifle Association, Rendell noted that penalties are tougher for receiving a stolen TV than a stolen gun.

Rendell is either ignorant of Pennsylvania law on this matter, or lying. Receiving stolen property is graded in Pennsylvania as a second degree felony if the property in question is a firearm. If the property is a car, it’s only a third degree felony. Receiving a television as stolen property is a first degree misdemeanor. I suspect Ed Rendell, as an attorney and former prosecutor, is well aware of this, and is deliberately misleading the public.

He said limiting handgun purchases to 12 a year would curb “straw purchases,” in which many weapons are purchased at once and resold to criminals.

Again, show me evidence that this constitutes a majority of trafficking, and show me proof that this law will have any real effect. South Carolina repealed its law because it didn’t. And Virginia weakened its one-gun-per month law. If 12 guns a year is enough, who’s to say that 1 a year isn’t enough? Sorry Ed, that’s not something politicians have any business deciding. Plus, if you only allow one a month, that means you’re keeping track of what I buy, right? Forgive me if I say f**k you.

Frankel said his amendment to make the penalty higher for receiving a stolen gun than a stolen TV failed last year in the House.

Funny, I just read the law, and the penalty is higher. If you want to see for yourself, look here to see how the law is graded. Here is the receiving stolen property law for Pennsylvania. I searched in vain for some evidence of Frankel’s defeated amendment, but couldn’t find it. It does appear in the past he’s tried to clarify the language by defining “firearm” in the state’s theft statute, probably to overcome the fact that a firearm can mean different things in different parts of Pennsylvania law, but still, this is house cleaning.

Politicians lie folks, and journalists don’t bother to check what they say or call them on their bullshit. It’s a sad state of affairs, but it’s part of the reason the blogosphere exists.

Which World I’d Rather Live In

Even though I think some tasks are best left for the police, I’d much rather live in a world where a few people are a little too eager to throw themselves into dangerous situations, than one where everyone cowers in the corner, crippled with fear, and then afterwards complains about how long it took the police to show up.

I think one thing that separates us from other people is we’re a bit more cognizant, and maybe even a little more accepting, of human limitations and failings. I’ve long thought that one of the key features of the left is a belief in the perfectibility of man, whereas we tend to think that’s a fool’s errand.

A person of the left would look at the two citizens, who tried to stop the killer in Idaho, and think “See, that’s exactly why only the police should have guns.” I’m sure many of us at least understand the motives that drive someone to go hunting after a killer, and therefore don’t see things that way.Â We may think it’s foolhardy, but view it as a consequence of human nature, and not something we can, or really should, try to weed from the population.

The left tends to place a great deal of faith in government, and tend to be the most surprised when it fails.Â Government failings aren’t simply an inevitable consequence of a system made up of imperfect humans, but are somehow the fault of those in positions of power. Put the right people in charge; people who have faith in, and are competent in the exercise of governmental power, and the world’s problems can be solved.Â Mankind can be perfected!Â This attitude, taken to the extreme, leads to Marxism. We deal with a much softer manifestation of that, but I’m convinced it all erupts from the same intellectual well.

It explains why the left is eager to trust police as the only ones with the means and authorization to engage in violence. The police are an organ of the state, which is the left’s primary tool.Â The idea that the police are just a collection of imperfect humans that we hire to do the job of keeping law and order, well, that idea is giant wrench thrown into the intellectual works.Â If the police make mistakes, if sometimes they fail to or cannot protect, indeed, if sometimes they actually even harm, then maybe those folks who demand that they have the means to act when the government can’t, or won’t, have a point, don’t they?

But accepting that means accepting you can never end crime, stop foolhardy people from trying to be heroes, prevent the idiot from accidentally shooting himself, or the depressed from doing it on purpose. It means accepting that man is not perfectible, and that’s a tough pill to swallow, especially if you’re, say, a politician or other person of means and influence, that fancies himself as one of those smart, competent people who is just the right person to tug on the levers of power.

Personally, I like living in a world with other imperfect human beings, and where people have the freedom to make decisions and take action, even if in hindsight we find that action foolish or reckless. I think most of the time, most of the people will do the right thing. I’d rather with a government that finds ways to work with its citizens rather than live under a government that just wants to manage them. To me it’s the difference between actually being free, and just saying you are.