Newsgroups: talk.politics.misc
From: [an 25970] at [anon.penet.fi]
Subject: More Fed Hypocrisy
Date: Wed, 27 Apr 1994 13:51:40 UTC

 * Originally By: [C--a--g] at [mainstream.com]
 * Original Area: TlkPolGuns

For Immediate Release   Call Tom Wyld, NRA Public Affairs

April 25, 1994                  (703-267-3820)

Reno's Message for NRA:

"SECOND AMENDMENT FOR MINE -- BUT NOT FOR THINE"

Washington, D.C. -- On April 20, Attorney General Janet Reno said,
"Assault weapons (sic) ... have no place in a civilized society."

Unless, of course, they're (a) genuine assault rifles and (b) the
owner's boss is Janet Reno.

Ms. Reno issued a strong in absentia call to ban certain semi-
automatic firearms.  But when an employee asked her permission to own
a fully automatic firearm -- a true assault rifle -- she gave the
go-ahead.

On January 23, 1984, then-State Attorney Janet Reno signed the federal
form granting permission for James Howard Woodard, a former employee
of Reno's, to own a genuine assault rifle -- a Colt M16A1 fully
automatic firearm.  (Document available on request.)

"The Attorney General said there should be a strong response' to
inaccurate and unfair attacks,'" said Mrs. Tanya K. Metaksa, chief
lobbyist of the National Rifle Association of America.  "There should
also be an equally strong response' to duplicity.

"Gun bans are the worst sort of practical joke," Mrs. Metaksa said.
"Citizens are fooled, police are threatened, and law-abiding gun
owners are prosecuted.  Only criminals and politicians exit laughing."

Borrowing Ms. Reno's words from April 20, Mrs. Metaksa said it is
"inaccurate and unfair' to ban firearms, simply because they look
like, but don't function like, the firearms Ms. Reno allows her
attorneys to keep and bear.  It is inaccurate and unfair' to
characterize such firearms as the gun of choice of criminals' when
they're rarely seen by police much less seized by them in connection
with crime.  And it is inaccurate and unfair' to claim that gun bans
work.  If they worked, Morton Grove, Illinois, wouldn't be staging a
gun buy-back program and Washington, D.C. would be a law and order
mecca and the cradle of democracy, not the crime capitol and cradle of
hypocrisy."

The greatest unfairness of gun prohibition, Mrs. Metaksa said, is its
impact on the law-abiding.

"This week, when U.S. Rep. Charles Schumer (D-NY) stages yet another
event to beat the drum for prohibition, I will be joined by a woman
prosecuted under California's assault weapons' ban.  When this woman
was tried, a forensic expert testified that her semiautomatic rifle
wasn't illegal and wasn't even on the ban list, but the prosecutor
pushed for her imprisonment.  For mere lawful possession of a legal
firearm, the prosecutor offered her jail time as a good deal.'

"I will do my utmost to gain for this woman audiences with politicians
who, like Janet Reno, want to ban guns.

"And I will ask those politicians to explain to this woman why jail
time is a good deal' for the mere exercise of her constitutional
right."

- nra - 
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