I was listening to the radio on my way to ... well ahhhh ... to ... ahhhh ... OK, it is league night, and I was playing with guns!
On the news they stated that the Dems stormed out of the capital in protest. However, Iowa law just requires a simple majority, and the GOP has over sixty there. They can conduct business and pass this if they wish.
The DEMS notified the press that they are upset because they claim they did not get fair notice that this was coming. They also said they are all together in Des Moines.
#1. I hope that they wait for the cry babies to come back and pass it with them there. That way there will be no whining that this was done in the dark allies;
#2. What happened to the open meeting laws? If elected officials can not gather in a setting without prior public notice, how can these clowns all be together and not breaking the law?
First off: m58, be not offended that I neither answered nor returned your phone call on this subject last evening. I was setting up for a Carry Permit Class inside a steel building and the phone didn't ring. In addition, it was after 10 before I found your voicemail, and thought it impolite to phone you at that hour of the night when nobody was dead or even bleeding bad.
The
crybabies Dems finally returned after about an 8-hour absence, at which time the bills, after lengthy debate, were passed (mostly along party lines), and sent to the Iowa Senate.
Video, as well as the text quoted below, can be found at the following link:
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20120301/NEWS/303010062/After-Iowa-legislative-walkout-gun-bills-advanceThe Iowa House advanced controversial legislation on Wednesday evening to loosen Iowa’s deadly-force law and write expansive gun rights into the state constitution.
The approvals, reached on near party-line votes, followed not only lengthy debate but also an hours-long — and, according to some, unprecedented — delay forced by the chamber’s Democratic minority, which fled the Capitol to protest the Republican majority’s decision to consider the bills.
Democrats argued that the measures fell outside the demands of “mainstream” Iowans (BULLSHIT!!) and wasted time that could be better spent on pursuing legislation that improves the state’s economy.
“When we started the session, we were told we would focus on the economy and jobs, and we were told we would avoid divisive issues,” Rep. Mary Mascher, D-Iowa City, said during the debate Wednesday evening. “We were lied to.”
Republicans, however, argued the proposed state constitutional amendment was necessary to clarify the state’s commitment to gun rights and resist potential restrictions by courts.
“This provides protections from future Supreme Court decisions that would limit or prohibit our rights to keep and bear arms,” said Rep. Matt Windschitl, R-Missouri Valley.
The proposed amendment, House Joint Resolution 2009, would bar the state from infringing on or denying a person’s right to “acquire, keep, possess, transport, carry, transfer, and use arms” and would prohibit firearm licensing, registration or special taxation.
The amendment would not nullify existing gun laws, Windschitl and others said, but would allow those laws to be challenged in court and perhaps invalidated.
As a constitutional amendment, the measure must be approved by both the House and Senate and then approved again by both chambers in a subsequent year. It would then go to the voters for ratification.
The second controversial (controversial in the opinion of the ultra-liberal rag, the DSM Register) bill, House File 2115, approved Wednesday night rewrites the law on “reasonable force,” so that a person could use force — including deadly force — against someone who they believe either threatens to kill or cause serious injury or is committing a violent felony.
Under the bill, a person would be presumed justified in using deadly force if he or she reasonably believed that deadly force was necessary to avoid the risk of injury or death. Iowa’s current law allows potential victims to use deadly force against a perceived threat only if an alternative course of action also entails “a risk to life or safety.” (This would be an improvement to current law, in that it would give the victim the right to "stand their ground")
Windschitl, the bill’s sponsor, invoked the case of Jay Rodney Lewis when calling for its approval on Wednesday. The West Des Moines man, whose story was reported by The Des Moines Register, spent 112 days in jail after firing on two men who accosted him last October. He was ultimately acquitted of counts of intimidation with a dangerous weapon and going armed with intent.
Lewis could have avoided the charges and the jail time altogether, Windschitl said, if the bill under consideration had been law.
Democrats did not speak out against the bill Wednesday night, although they voted almost uniformly against it and earlier in the day circulated a news release saying it would “essentially turn the streets of Iowa into the Wild West.” (Wasn't that a movie starring Will Smith?)
Both measures now move to the Senate, which is controlled by Democrats. (Don't look for it to emerge from that body, at least not before being completely eviscerated.)
The House’s Republican majority had intended to begin debating the gun legislation and several other bills on Wednesday morning, but was delayed when the Democratic minority left the Capitol en masse at around 10 a.m. and refused to return until after 4 p.m.
Democrats walked out because Republicans failed to provide proper notice about their plans to debate the bills on Wednesday, Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said, leaving his party without time to draw up and offer changes to the bills.
“We have been double-crossed as a caucus,” McCarthy, D-Des Moines, said. “We’re not going to sit back and be treated with historic misuse of power.” (Insert "WHINY" emoticon here)
But Republican House Leader Linda Upmeyer, R-Garner, shot back that Democrats did have adequate warning, and suggested their flight from the Capitol was an attempt to make a political scene.
“Iowans didn’t send us down here just to do easy stuff,” she said. “The Second Amendment is a question that many Iowans would like placed before them. I don’t know why they’re afraid to have a debate on a subject just because they don’t like the subject. That seems ludicrous to me.”
Republicans hold a 60-to-40 majority in the House, which allows them to set the calendar for debate and largely control the legislative process.
The Democrats were incommunicado for much of the day, reaching out from their undisclosed location at midafternoon only to suggest to House Speaker Kraig Paulsen that they would return only if Republicans set aside the gun legislation for the day.
That, however, was a nonstarter for the GOP. “Someone doesn’t get to have a tantrum and leave the Capitol and all of a sudden we’re changing the debate schedule,” Paulsen said. “That’s not how that works.” (Whaddaya know, a group of Republicans who grew a pair, and ACTED like the majority party! I didn't think that was possible.)
The Democrats’ six-hour disappearance was unprecedented in recent memory, lawmakers and others said.
Gov. Terry Branstad, who appeared in the House chamber Wednesday afternoon for a Black History Month program that was cut short by the Democrats’ absence, said he could not recall a similar situation in Iowa.
“I think most people think that when you’re elected to serve, you should be there when duty calls,” said Branstad, who served in the Legislature in the 1970s and also was governor from 1983 to 1999.
Longtime lawmaker Stewart Iverson, R-Clarion, said it’s not uncommon for a party caucus to hold an extended private meeting in order to delay consideration of a bill, but that he couldn’t recall lawmakers absconding from the Capitol as the Democrats did Wednesday.
“It’s a little unusual that they actually left the building, but it’s not unusual to go to caucus and spend several hours there,” Iverson said.
Democrats returned shortly after 4 p.m., held a news conference and then returned to the House floor to open debate.
The debate began at about 4:40 p.m., about eight hours after the House initially convened, and wrapped up shortly after 8 p.m.
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bold print in the above quote are the opinions of this poster. Your mileage may vary. Or not. I really don't care.
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Topic: Iowa Democrat Legislators Throw A Temper Tantrum Over A Pair Of 2-A Bills (Read 3679 times)