Thank you, sweet Virginia!!!!!!
Ever hear of Operation Bluebird, readers?
"Bill to Tighten Sale of Guns Is Turned Back in Virginia" by IAN URBINA
RICHMOND, Va. — Despite fervent support from families of those killed in the Virginia Tech massacre, a bill that would have required background checks of buyers at gun shows in Virginia has been defeated in a State Senate committee.
The vote, on Wednesday, signaled an end to efforts to pass gun control legislation in this session of the General Assembly. It was a blow not only to survivors of Virginia Tech’s dead but also to Gov. Tim Kaine, a Democrat who strongly supported the bill and whose party controls the Senate.
Seven Republicans and two rural Democrats on the Senate’s 15-member Courts of Justice Committee teamed up to defeat the measure. A committee of the Republican-controlled House rejected similar legislation last week, but the bill’s advocates had held out hope that passage in the Senate might revive prospects in the House.
Federal and Virginia laws bar felons, the mentally ill and domestic abusers from buying firearms, and require licensed gun dealers to screen out such customers through instant computerized background checks. Neither state nor federal law, however, requires background checks on people who buy from unlicensed sellers at gun shows.
Still, gun rights advocates had argued that the bill was unnecessary. “The legislation was brought about on the back of a horrible tragedy, when in reality this tragedy had nothing to do with gun shows,” said Andrew Arulanandam, a spokesman for the National Rifle Association.
Gun rights groups pointed out that Seung-Hui Cho, who killed 32 people at Virginia Tech last April 16 before committing suicide, did not buy at a gun show the two semiautomatic weapons he used, and Mr. Arulanandam added that there was no evidence that many guns used in crimes came from gun shows.
The bill’s supporters expressed frustration at the outcome of the vote.
“It’s very difficult to see the merit in the other side’s argument, because what we are suggesting would not affect law-abiding gun owners,” said Andrew Goddard, who attended Wednesday’s committee vote and whose son Colin was shot four times by Mr. Cho but survived.
“The Second Amendment,” Mr. Goddard added, “refers to properly regulated militias, but the State of Virginia is unwilling to properly regulate armed people by keeping out the mentally ill or criminals.”
Did you notice how slanted that article was towards the disarmament side, readers?
That's the NYT for you! PUSHING THEIR AGENDA!!!!
And the sweet state of Virginia gave us a TWO-FER!!!!
"Virginia Nears an About-Face on Costly Driver Penalties" by IAN URBINA
RICHMOND, Va. — Responding to complaints from thousands of state residents, a Virginia Senate committee approved a measure Wednesday repealing costly fees that were being levied against residents caught driving 20 miles above the speed limit or engaging in other reckless driving.
The fees, which took effect July 1, ranged from $750 to $3,000 and were supposed to help raise money for road projects, avoid a tax increase, and improve road safety.
It's what is known a s a SHAKEDOWN, folks!
Instead, they led to an online petition with more than 177,000 signers and at least 15 bills filed in the state legislature calling for their repeal.
All right!!!!!!!
They also led the governor, Tim Kaine, a Democrat, to reverse his initial support for the fees after a study by the General Assembly’s investigative branch found that they would not produce the revenues initially predicted.
With highway deaths last year in the state topping 1,000 for the first time since 1990, the fees had obviously failed to make the state’s roads safer, Governor Kaine said on Jan. 9 in his third State of the Commonwealth address. Many police officers and judges also complained about the measure because of the paperwork the fees created and the time required to process them.
Delegate David B. Albo, a Republican from Fairfax County, who sponsored the initial proposal for the fees, said that rather than eliminating them, lawmakers should have retooled them to reduce the number of offenses they covered. Nonetheless, Mr. Albo voted in favor of a House of Delegates bill on Tuesday repealing the fees. The Senate is likely to vote on the measure on Monday.
“Unfortunately,” Mr. Albo said, “the issue got Internet and blogger stink all over it, which meant there was so much misinformation surrounding the issue that it couldn’t be salvaged.”
FUCK YOU, GRAPES!!!!!!!!!!
Ha-ha-ha-ha!!!
Yes, WE DO HAVE POWER, YES!!!!!!!!!!!!
Bryan Ault takes credit for much of that stink.
“For me, the lesson here is that government is accountable only if people hold it accountable,” said Mr. Ault, the 28-year-old Alexandria resident who started the online petition.
I like this guy!
He said that in the months since starting the petition in early July, he received a surprising number of e-mail comments from signers, many of them Republicans, supporting a 1-cent increase in the gasoline tax as an alternative to the fees.
Out-of-state drivers were exempted from the fees because Mr. Kaine said it would be difficult to force nonresidents to pay, for practical and legal reasons. Many of the petitioners said they resented that the fees were discriminatory, Mr. Ault said.
Still unclear, however, is how state lawmakers will get the $65 million that the fees were supposed to raise annually.
“We’re going to be short some money, that’s for sure,” said the Senate Finance Committee chairman, Charles J. Colgan, a Democrat from Prince William County.
Mr. Colgan said that in terms of alternate methods of financing for road construction, two Senate bills had been proposed seeking to raise the gasoline tax by 2 cents, which would produce $100 million, and a third bill to increase taxes on off-track betting, which would also probably cover the $65 million deficit.
“Problem with all three bills,” he said, “is they don’t have a chance to pass.”
Good, because they are all a way of fucking the people!
Way to go, Virginia!!
The AMERICAN SPIRIT of FREEDOM and LIBERTY is ALIVE!!!!!!!!!!!
