[lbo-talk] the blind carrying guns

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Wed Oct 24 16:40:56 PDT 2007


[sorry forgot to include the news article]

FOX NEWS/ Oct. 24, 2007

Giuliani: Blind Should Be Able to Carry Guns

LEBANON, N.H. — Republican presidential front-runner Rudy Giuliani is leaving the door open to allowing the blind and physically disabled to carry guns.

During a town hall meeting in northwestern New Hampshire Tuesday night, Giuliani told a former police officer blinded in the line of duty and concerned about the former New York City mayor's stance on guns, "You don't have to worry."

"You have a constitutional right that is protected, to bear and carry arms. It is the Second Ame ndment," Giuliani told about 200 attendees in a high school gymnasium in Lebanon. "If someone disagrees with that, you have to get the Constitution changed."

He added that he believes in only three restrictions for those wishing to exercise their Second Amendment right — a previous criminal record, a history of mental instability and an age requirement.

Kenyon Tuthill, 61, who served as a Suffolk County, N.H., police officer until his injury, told FOX News that he was satisfied with Giuliani's answer.

During his two terms as mayor, Giuliani supported strict gun laws at both the local and national level and advocated the federal assault weapons ban that expired in 2004. But as a presidential candidate, he vows to protect Second Amendment rights at the federal level allowing state and local authorities to determine their own "reasonable" restrictions.

New Hampshire, the Live Free Or Die State, is known for its limited gun-control laws, including no waiting period for purchases, no background checks for buyers of rifles and shotguns and no restrictions on children under 18 possessing firearms, according to the Brady Campaign, a gun-control advocacy group.

But the rural state with lots of sportsmen and a high rate of gun ownership annually has fewer than 100 total murders, including non- gun crimes, and Second Amendment rights are hugely important to constituents of both parties.

New Hampshire allows the blind to possess firearms, Tuthill said.



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