-Caveat Lector- http://www.nytimes.com/library/national/062899ct-rowland-gun.html June 28, 1999 NEWS ANALYSIS Backing Gun-Seizure Bill Reflects G.O.P. Governors' Move to the Center ----------------------------------------- By MIKE ALLEN HARTFORD -- While other states debate gun-control laws, Connecticut is about to get a gun-seizure law, intended to disarm dangerous people before they fire. By promising to sign the measure, Gov. John G. Rowland, a Republican, is providing one of the starkest illustrations yet of how far some G.O.P. officials are going in an effort to change their party's face. Governor Rowland is part of a class of Republicans, personified most prominently by Gov. George W. Bush of Texas, who are challenging old images of the party by playing down ideological bugle calls and pursuing policies that will help win the votes of women and suburbanites. Connecticut's gun bill, the first of its sort in the nation, would allow the police to get a warrant to confiscate the firearms of anyone who "poses a risk of imminent personal injury to himself or herself or to other individuals." The factors to be considered by a judge before issuing the warrant include threats, alcohol abuse and cruelty to animals. [ Since when is a judge knowledgeable enough to take away a right belonging to each individual. What kind of threat will warrant the stealing of a person's weapon. Just how drinks will be considered "abuse." And if a person is drinking who is to say that will make them want to pull a gun and shoot someone? How can this judge know that a person will commit a crime, are all judges seers or just authoritarian assholes?] No judge has the right or authority to steal the property of another person. No judge is any better than you or I or 260 million other people that live in this country.] Legal scholars say the bill may violate three or more amendments to the Constitution. Hunters in the state call it the "turn-in-your-neighbor law," arguing that it will leave them ripe for false accusations in custody fights or neighborhood disputes. [ These "legal scholars" must have their head up their ass. Anyone who can read the Bill of Rights can tell you there is no Constitutional authority to take a gun away from anyone. These "legal scholars" are probably leftist punks that are so brainwashed they couldn't answer truthfully if their lives depended on it. They are politically correct (meaning they are liars).] Rowland's signature on the bill will cement his status as one of the most moderate of the nation's prominent Republicans. This is a very different John Rowland from the one who was elected to Congress in 1984 on Ronald Reagan's coattails. Back then, Rowland goaded Democratic leaders into starting Congressional sessions with the Pledge of Allegiance and bragged in his official biography about his plan to "save $1 billion over three years by rooting out welfare fraud." Campaigning successfully for his first term as governor in 1994, he railed about the cable television and other "Club-Med-like amenities" at a new state prison. [Seems to me this "republican" is merely a communist.] Now, he says his priorities are "the three C's -- cities, children and civility," and his Web site heralds his record on issues like urban revitalization, children's health and environmental protection. [the children, civil society -- the guy is definitely one of the global fascists] Rowland, who at 42 is the nation's youngest governor, said that supporting the gun bill was "a no-brainer" after April's shootings in Littleton, Colo., which killed a dozen high-school students. He acknowledged that "civil libertarians will be able to make some good arguments" against the bill, but said he trusted the police and courts to use discretion in applying it. [This guy is an asshole if he thinks the courts and police can be trusted to use descretion. They will use descretion, yeah right ... like staying out of harms way for hours to let the body count go up ... as long as they are safe, they could care less if children are being killed. They should be brought up on charges of not performing their duties, they should at least be fired, each and every one of them and their pictures and addresses put in the paper to give the dead students parents an equal shot at protecting the big, tough SWAT team.] "I may not understand it or accept it, but the world is changing," Rowland said in an interview on Friday. "As society changes, laws have to change to protect citizens along the way. Sometimes you have to try new and different and creative ways to solve problems. You have to take some risks." [talk about double-speak; *definitely* a global fascist -- sounds like Bill Clinton and Al Gore combined] Other politicians may resist labels. Rowland, an early endorser of Governor Bush for the Presidency, proudly declares himself "a moderate, centrist, pragmatic, common-sense, compassionate conservative." [anyone supporting the Bush clan is either too uneducated to hold office or is a proud member of the global fascist elite wannabe's] He plans to veto only one of the 307 bills sent to him by the Connecticut Legislature during the session that ended this month, even though Democrats control both chambers. Among the bills he has signed is a requirement that health insurers pay for contraception for women, which abortion opponents in Connecticut said was their biggest loss in a decade. When he was in Congress, Rowland opposed abortion, but he became a supporter of abortion rights before running for governor. Rowland's malleability, which has led critics to brand him "the whatever governor," makes him look like a pioneer in a party where many of the up-and-comers are eager to have voters forget the bad old days of 1994, when Republicans were talking about cleaning out the government stables. Bush is soaring in opinion polls with his sunny talk on the presidential nomination trail of a Republicanism that is "generous of heart" and a nation where "the weak are valued." Gov. Frank Keating of Oklahoma, the chairman of the Republican Governors Association, said in an interview on Friday that all but 5 or 6 of the nation's 31 G.O.P. governors were moderate conservatives. "We have to bring everyone together -- black, white, red and yellow -- to reach consensus and advance the ball," he said. Those moderates include Rowland's next-door neighbors -- George E. Pataki of New York and Christine Todd Whitman of New Jersey. Like Rowland, Pataki has proved politically multilingual, avoiding a revolt by party regulars even as he has reached out to independents and Democrats. Mrs. Whitman, nationally prominent for her moderate views on social issues, has had more trouble with conservatives. But she has been increasingly attentive to their concerns since her uncomfortably narrow re-election in 1997, most recently by supporting notification of a parent before a teen-age girl can get an abortion. Brad Coker, the managing director of Mason-Dixon Polling and Research Inc., in Washington, pointed out that by "moving to the center, getting off ideology and talking about issues that people care about," the nation's Republican governors were copying the strategy that won the White House for President Clinton in 1992. In contrast to the governors' pragmatism, however, the alpha Republicans in Washington still seem to be playing from old cue cards featuring rigid rhetoric and philosophical purity at the expense of public opinion. Mark D. Pfeifle, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee, contends, "When the dust settles, they all have the same goals and in many cases the same outcomes." [global fascism] As part of Rowland's new-look Republicanism, he decided long ago simply to ignore issues that can be red meat in his party, including school vouchers and single-sex marriage. He said he considered debates on those "no-win issues" to be a waste of time that would change nobody's mind. During this year's Gay Pride Month, for example, he refused to sign the proclamation that local organizers wanted, but did not prevent them from flying their rainbow-striped flag over the State Capitol. Sometimes his attention span seems to be as short as that of the voters. This spring, he squeezed legislators to insure passage of financing for a stadium and convention center for downtown Hartford, as salve for the loss suffered by the city when the New England Patriots football team decided not to move here. But legislators never took up a plan he offered in a budget address in February for tax credits to help families pay for higher education, and he has not pushed it further. Although moderation is very much of the moment, Governor Rowland's critics argue that his most recent stances amount to proof of what they had long suspected -- that his views have no fixed address. "Ideology is not important to him, nor particularly are ideas," said State Senator Kevin B. Sullivan, the Senate's highest-ranking Democrat. "His role and his power and his position are, so he takes the path of least resistance." The gun-seizure measure, which is part of a broader firearm-safety bill, is likely to win Rowland favorable publicity when he signs it in the coming week, but may prove to be a headache in the long run. Steven B. Duke, a Yale Law School professor who specializes in criminal law, said, "An anonymous caller could tell the police, 'Joe Blotz has a gun and is making weird noises,' and that would be enough for them to act." [this is exactly what will happen whether a person has a gun or not] Laurence H. Tribe of Harvard Law School also sees serious constitutional problems with the bill. "Encouraging a society of whispers and rumors," he said, "hardly seems conducive to a society where people feel safe and secure." [Soon the people in Nazi Germany will have more rights than we will if this socialist agenda keeps going on without anyone putting a stop to it, but the rich control this country and the rich have their rights] None of the criticism fazes Rowland, who is basking in Connecticut Republicans' speculation that his longtime support of Bush will win him a shot at the vice presidential nomination, or perhaps an eventual Cabinet post. (The Connecticut cognoscenti have settled, somehow, on Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.) Governor Rowland was referring to the gun bill, but he could have been talking about his own stands, when he said serenely, "This is a product that can be refined along the way." [What he means is that he has no principles, no scruples and is just a mirror image of Zipperboy Clinton and his Socialist/Communist/Marxist supporters.] Copyright 1999 The New York Times Company DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. 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