The campaign and independent credentials of U.S. Rep. Robert Dold (R-Kenilworth) may have received a boost this week as New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, the country’s most recognizable political independent and a billionaire to boot, indicated that he will use some of his cash in support of Dold. However, it is unclear why Bloomberg likes Dold more than Democratic challenger Brad Schneider of Deerfield, outside of the fact that Bloomberg has previously worked with the lawmaker.
The New York Times reported yesterday that Bloomberg formed a Super Political Action Committee that plans to spend up to $15 million in close local and Congressional races. The article identified four candidates who Bloomberg has already singled out, including Dold, based on the North Shore lawmaker’s stance on gun control.
Dold, who did not return calls for comment today, says on his campaign Web site that “I have worked with organizations like Mayor Bloomberg’s group, Mayors Against Illegal Guns” and “I support reasonable restrictions on gun ownership.”
But Schneider has similar gun control rhetoric on his Web site and goes a step further by laying out specific legislation he would support as a member of Congress. This includes reinstating the federal assault weapons ban, a bill that President Bill Clinton signed into law in 1996, which expired in 2004.
Dold has not given his position on the assaults weapon ban. In an interview with the Vernon Hills Review this August, campaign spokesman John McGovern answered a question about the assault weapons ban by noting that Dold “supports closing gun show loopholes” and “has worked with New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg to support legislation to keep firearms out of the hands of potential terrorists.”
The assault weapons ban somewhat reemerged as a national issue this week. President Barack Obama was asked during the presidential debate Tuesday what he has done to keep AK-47 automatic weapons off the street.
The president responded by essentially endorsing a return to the assault weapons ban. But he then pivoted to a discussion of other topics and appears unlikely to expend political capital on the issue.
Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney opposes the assault weapons ban.
Super PACs are allowed to give unlimited cash to political candidates so long as they do not directly coordinate with the campaign. It is not known how much money Bloomberg will set aside for Dold, who has raised more money than Schneider. Dold broughtin $3.9 million through the end of September compared to Schenider's $2.6 million.
Each candidate has benefited from Super PAC money. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, the House Majority PAC has contributed nearly $1 million to Schneider. Lunch Pail Republicans and the New Prosperity Foundation are Super PACs that have given six figures to Dold.
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A SIMPLE RESPONSE
(Reader's Digest Version)
I ought to be a poster boy for more gun-control laws. My mother was a forty-four year old a (nobody) when she was shot to death Wednesday morning September 9, 1981, in Houston, Texas. She was waiting to clock into work with a group of co-workers that morning when she was gunned down right in front of them. There was nothing anyone could have done to save her. Her attacker was the only one present who was armed. He emptied all six shots from his revolver were into her body. After she was shot and down on the ground he used his empty pistol like a rock and started to pistol-whip her. Neither mercy nor quarter was given. After his gun was empty and the pistol-whipping was going on her co-workers finally restrained her attacker and held him for the police. She died about an hour later in the E.R. at Ben Taub Hospital. Pardon the graphic details I have had over thirty one years to live with these facts-of-life that no one should have to live with. With what follows maybe being graphic will give a better understanding for what I have come to believe.
I suppose it is understood that a number of laws were broken that that morning. Murders often exercise their “cruel an unusual” capital punishment on anyone anytime they please. It is open season on us all. We only hear of the bloodshed when they target a high profile (somebody) or (groups) especially if children are involved. For the forth and fifth estates the higher profile, the larger the group and especially with children all the better. Emotions will rule the day and logic be-damned!
The cost a typical murderer pays is small in comparison to their crime. Freedom from “cruel an unusual punishment” is only a right reserved for the guilty. Their victims just get to die! It wasn't until many years later I learned my mother’s executioner had murdered before! So that it is clearly understood he was under a restraining order, he was a convicted felon, a convicted felon with a gun and a convicted felon with a gun committing murder again! Any one with half a brain knows these things are all against the law! Simply put neither laws nor the police protect anyone, but more on that latter.
Six years in prison on average is the cost most murderers pay. A few years confinement on the taxpayer dime is the cost for so many innocent lives lost. A high profile victim a (somebody) or a (large group) may serve a little more time, maybe life, maybe! Occasionally some do get the needle or as it is now so often being called “cruel an unusual punishment”. This as opposed to the charity they showed their victims I suppose.
A murderer uses the best weapon available to them. Neither guns, rocks, knives or hammers simply jump up and kill by themselves. They are all inanimate tools designed and made with specific purposes in mind. Still there are no calls to ban equally deadly rocks, knives and hammers. Just guns! Still dead is dead whichever tool used to kill. So why do moral crusaders only advocate gun-control or bans? Is it merely because of the superior killing efficiency design of a firearm to cause death? I’d doubt it, and besides as a tool what good is firearm that is inefficient? None! It’s quite true some guns by design can kill and kill faster and more efficiently than any rock, knife or hammer. Gun-control proponents claim to be unable to understand these simple facts. Guns in the hands of free citizens may be used decisively against criminals and government tyranny. So the superior killing efficiency of a firearm makes it the best tool for the job of stopping crime and tyranny. The Second Amendment is not about hunting or shooting but about we who wish to live free or die trying. Proponents of gun-control understand this perfectly but would never admit it. If it wasn’t true the police and military would both be armed with rocks, knives and hammers. The eight-hundred pound gorilla in the room is the criminal, the media, politicians and anti-gun moral crusaders. I stated before the motives of the fourth and fifth estates are clear. No doubt they completely understand the gun-control stakes. When leader’s no longer lead they maneuver only for raw power and unimpeded rule!
Murder victims never receive a jury trial, they have no rights to appeal; victims only have to submit to a painful and often brutal death! That morning my mom just thought she was just going to work. Instead she was just going to die! I don't get to see her again, ever! No visits from friends and family like her murderer probably received. I just visit a stone in a graveyard and wonder what might have been if only... At that time we learned we couldn’t to be informed about his trial or his fate. It was against the law! It took the advent of the internet to finally learn a few meager details, most notably six years and out. Betty was a (nobody), but as “Momma” she was a (somebody) to me!
I’d finally had enough. I’m emotional about all of this no doubt. That doesn’t alter the logic. For years I’ve watched celebrities and politicians, listened to countless talking heads and read all these agenda driven articles. Clueless but cunning people with a public platform I’ll never have. They all express the same stupid pap this article did. Big deal! Go right ahead, explain the logic of this mindless ideology to my mother, and shout it real loud. The dead don’t hear well!
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