PA Bill Number: HR541

Title: Recognizing the month of October 2024 as "Domestic Violence Awareness Month" in Pennsylvania.

Description: A Resolution recognizing the month of October 2024 as "Domestic Violence Awareness Month" in Pennsylvania.

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Last Action Date: Sep 27, 2024

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Walker in, made Wis. 49th CCW state, can 2A critics be far behind? :: 07/15/2015

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker yesterday made it official by becoming the 15th Republican seeking his party’s nomination to run for president next year, and now the clock is running to see how long it will take some Second Amendment internet purist to start beating him up.

Walker is the guy who brought the Badger State into the 21st Century four years ago by signing a concealed carry measure into law. That’s something his anti-gun predecessor had vetoed twice, and it’s something the gun prohibition lobby despises him for doing.

Last month, he signed a couple of pro-gun-rights bills into law, including one that eliminated Wisconsin’s 48-hour waiting period. So, how could anyone in the Second Amendment community dislike this guy? Don’t worry, somebody out there will find an excuse because some “gun people” just can’t resist the urge to eat their own. Perhaps they should try the vegan lifestyle.

This morning, an e-mail popped into this column’s Inbox from the Walker camp, comparing his “A+” rating from the National Rifle Association to Hillary Rodham Clinton’s “F” grade from that group. Clinton’s failing score is consistent among the leading Second Amendment organizations, and it is hardly a secret that she is not their friend.

Walker, on the other hand, is a populist with some strong credentials. USA Today predicted he will outlast Donald Trump in the primary races. Indeed, that newspaper yesterday had this to say: “While celebrity billionaire Donald Trump seems certain to make the cutoff to participate in the first debate next month, for instance, the conventional wisdom says there's virtually no chance he'll be on stage for the final debates next year, when the Republican nominee faces the Democratic one.”

“Conventional wisdom” is often the speed bump in a road followed by potholes for the establishment press. Guys like Trump, and Walker, defy conventional wisdom habitually. Trump has surged in popularity beyond what the “conventionally wise” pundits feared, and Walker survived a recall effort by the unions that a lot of people expected to be his political demolition.

But focus on the message Walker is sending the grassroots troops who care about their Second Amendment rights. “Fresh from my announcement for President,” his message states, “it is vital I contact you about our shared commitment to protect the right to keep and bear arms. I support the rights of law-abiding citizens to own firearms…The last time I checked, the 2nd Amendment is part of the Constitution. President Obama thinks he gets to pick and choose which parts he likes and doesn’t like. He is wrong.

“We will stand together and fight with all we’ve got,” Walker’s message continues. “Hillary has been coming after your guns for years. Whenever there is a gun control bill, you can bet she is for it. She has even gone so far as to take the extreme position of supporting a national gun registry! You just can’t trust her with your right to bear arms.”

He then promises to defend the Constitution and “make sure no one tells you if you get to keep your gun.” The message adds, “The gun control bullies don’t scare me one bit. I stood up to their kind in the recall race that the Washington Democrats and Big Government Labor Bosses waged against me in 2012 and we won that race by staying true to our values.”

Boilerplate, perhaps, but it’s the kind of rhetoric that will find appeal among millions of law-abiding gun owners who have been under attack simply because they own firearms. They’re not the ones who pulled the trigger in Charleston, or on that San Francisco pier, or Seattle’s Café Racer, Aurora’s movie theater, Oregon’s shopping mall or Virginia’s university campus. Yet measures ostensibly designed to prevent that sort of thing have really only penalized the citizens who didn’t commit the crime.

All that said, somebody in the gun ranks will likely find something they don’t like about Walker and start complaining about it across cyberspace. The trick is to not listen.

Firearms owners are a diverse lot, so there’s bound to be disagreement over any number of subjects. At the end of the day – or in this case, at the end of the campaign season next year – if Clinton is the Democrat contender, it may be up to gun owners to stop her short of the Oval Office. It’s not too early to be thinking about that.

MEANWHILE, it’s true, this correspondent was yesterday named by Newsmax among “100 Most Influential Pro-Gun Rights Advocates.” There is some pretty good company on that list, and some curious omissions (SAF’s Alan Gottlieb, NRA’s Chris Cox, broadcasters Tom Gresham and Mark Walters, for example).