PA Bill Number: HB2235
Title: Providing for regulation of the meat packing and food processing industry by creating facility health and safety committees in the workplace; ...
Description: Providing for regulation of the meat packing and food processing industry by creating facility health and safety committees in the workplace; ... ...
Last Action: Referred to LABOR AND INDUSTRY
Last Action Date: Apr 25, 2024
Pa. case underscores gun control hypocrisy; Idaho eyes permitless carry bill :: 03/11/2016
Nothing underscores the hypocrisy of the gun control movement better than a case heard yesterday by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in which anti-gunners are challenging a 2014 law that allows Second Amendment groups to sue cities that adopt tough gun laws.
A Commonwealth Court subsequently overturned the law, but according to the Washington Times, Republican state lawmakers want the high court to revive the statute. However, in the interim, “dozens of municipalities repealed gun-control regulations rather than risk a lawsuit,” the newspaper said.
Meanwhile, the gun prohibition lobby wants Congress to repeal a federal statute that prevents cities and others from filing harassment lawsuits against firearms makers because their products are misused by criminals over whom they have no control. The Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) became law during the Bush administration, and Democrat front runner Hillary Clinton has even targeted that statute in her campaign, misrepresenting what the law does and doesn’t do in the process.
The Washington Times said the Pennsylvania law is being challenged by “several Democratic state senators…along with the mayors of Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Lancaster.” While they may have an argument, because the lawsuit bill's language was attached to another bill dealing with the theft of scrap metal, and in the Keystone State, that’s not allowed, the underlying motive here is to protect anti-gun city administrations from the same kind of legal recourse they want to practice against gun makers.
Of course, gun rights activists argue, hypocrisy is a cornerstone of the gun prohibition movement. Big money anti-gunners like Michael Bloomberg have their own armed security, but they want everyone else disarmed.
Bloomberg and his lobbying group, Everytown for Gun Safety, has had a rough time over the past several days. West Virginia lawmakers last week overrode the governor’s veto of “Constitutional carry” legislation, and now in Idaho, lawmakers in Boise will hold a hearing on a “permitless carry” bill in the Gem State.
Yesterday, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms encouraged its members in Idaho to support SB 1389, introduced by State Sen. Curt McKenzie (R-Nampa). Under this proposal, Idaho residents over age 21 would be able to carry a sidearm concealed inside city limits without a permit if they are not disqualified from being issued a permit. The bill also protects the existing exemption for people over age 18 to carry concealed outside city and town limits, according to the National Rifle Association, which also supports it.
McKenzie told Examiner via telephone this morning that 1389 is the second version of the legislation this year. An earlier version raised some concerns from constituents because the language inadvertently affected an existing right under current law that allows 18-to-21-year-olds to carry concealed outside of the limits of cities or towns.
“As far as I know,” McKenzie said, “there is no opposition from law enforcement.”
The NRA notes on its website that SB 1389 also will “create a shall issue concealed weapon licensing regime for law-abiding individuals who are between 18 and 21 years of age” who have completed state-mandated training requirements.
“Idaho can join a handful of other states that have taken similar actions by eliminating the need for a piece of paper to exercise the constitutional right to bear arms,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb in Wednesday statement. “We have seen no evidence that permitless carry by honest citizens has been a concern to public safety, anywhere it has become law.
“We know that the gun prohibition lobby tried to prevent West Virginia from adopting what is generically called ‘Constitutional Carry,’ but last week their Legislature overrode the governor’s veto,” he added. “Their sky-is-falling rhetoric should never trump the constitution or the right of self-defense.”
The Idaho Reporter noted that the legislation has been endorsed by the Idaho Second Amendment Alliance. A hearing on the bill is scheduled next Monday morning at 8 a.m. in the Lincoln Auditorium at the Capitol in Boise before the Senate State Affairs Committee. Sen. McKenzie chairs that committee.
