Posted on 03/12/2007 11:40:06 AM PDT by neverdem
Hysteria trumped reason yet again at the Colorado State Capitol when a Senate committee killed the so-called "Make My Day Better" bill on a party-line vote.
Responsible gun owners regularly find themselves subjected to this kind of treatment by wet-diaper, nanny-state liberals who believe that any Colorado citizen with a gun is barely capable of suppressing some ravenous urge to shoot everyone who casts so much as a cross-eyed glance.
House Bill 1011 was sound and reasonable, extending to workers in a business the right to protect themselves against an imminent criminal threat - the same right that Coloradans have enjoyed in their homes since 1985.
So reasonable, in fact, that Rep. Cory Gardner, R-Yuma, who sponsored the bill, picked up the support of nine Democrats in addition to all 29 Republicans when the bill passed the House of Representatives.
Unfortunately, the likelihood that the bill would receive similar bipartisan support if it came to a vote in the full Senate no doubt factored prominently in anti-gun Senate President Joan Fitz-Gerald's decision to assign the bill to the Senate State Affairs Committee, where opponents of our Second Amendment rights rule with an iron fist.
There, the bill died on a 3-2 party-line vote with Democrats opposing the right to self-defense and Republicans supporting it.
"What we're trying to do here, I think, is create some street-imposed death penalty . . . over a Milky Way bar," warned Sen. Peter Groff, D-Denver.
Sen. Groff, the usually more thoughtful Senate president pro tem, worried aloud that an irascible store clerk might start gunning down teenagers for talking too loud, wearing their hat backward or listening to rap music.
That's quite a statement about how some lawmakers view the good judgment of Colorado's working men and women - to suggest that the only thing stopping the average service worker from blasting inconsiderate customers is a state law.
Moreover, the analogy demonstrates a lack of understanding of the plain language of the bill, which stipulates that these protections apply only if the person who poses the threat enters the property unlawfully.
Coloradans were confronted with similar knee-jerk hysteria when former Sen. Jim Brandon introduced the original "Make My Day" law 22 years ago. Those predictions never came to fruition.
When Colorado finally passed a uniform statewide right-to-carry law in 2003, the nanny-statists predicted that our communities would look like Dodge City and that minor traffic altercations would erupt into gunfights. But reality and the stable judgment of Colorado citizens proved them wrong.
Most of us would hope that after being so wrong for so long, the anti-gun crazies would be more accepting of the prospect that we common folk can be trusted to act responsibly.
Sen. Ted Harvey, R-Highlands Ranch, explained, albeit in futility, why such a law is necessary and rational: "Law enforcement can't be there at all times."
And despite the selfless sacrifices made by law enforcement officers, they are not legally required to come to your defense even if they do happen to be there.
Unfortunately for responsible citizens, it's not enough to have logic, history or perhaps even a majority of legislators on your side.
This needs to become an issue nationwide. Make the DemonRats oppose it, and make them explain their opposition in 2008.
So much for the new "moderate" image of the Democratic Party.
Not surprising - hysteria frequently trumps everything.
The Left has been very successful in casting this as "Vote for Gun Control and life will be safer." We need to contrast this "Vote against gun control because *guns* make our world safer."
The citizens have to remember all that crap when it comes time to vote and get rid of the jerks. If the populace in Colorado is willing to tolerate these morons in government, they have nobody to blame but themselves. Don't get mad...get even!!
Ignorant people that don't know how to behave or can't control themselves tend to assume everyone else is like that
The citizens of Colorado should DEMAND the removal of all armed police in and around the state capitol building. If armed protection in the workplace isn't allowed for average Coloradoans, it shouldn't be allowed for the politicians in their workplace either. Nobody gets special protection.
Our problem here in Colorado is that the libtards in DENVER have the population to elect themselves a legislative majority - and hold the rest of the State (which is very conservative) under their political thumb(s).
Now, I don't mind too much that the lower house congressional districts are apportioned by population. But the way the state senatorial districts are apportioned is downright contrived to ensure Denverian supremacy.
See the map here: http://192.70.175.80/State/map.asp?state=CO&scope=&command=find&name=_self&cat=1&map=3
That dense cluster of districts in the North-Central part of the state - Denver.
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