Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch, Inc. has been searching through the recently released Clinton Presidential Library records. He assumes, which is probably quite accurate, that what Bill did on gun rights, Hillary would pick up where he left off. Do I need to explain why?
Fitton finds a couple of documents that helps to spell out the intentions at the time of Bill Clinton’s presidency.
A memorandum from former Clinton Advisor Sidney Blumenthato Bruce Reed, Director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, dated November 9, 1998, which reads: “I’ve enclosed an article and a press release about the new effort to file class action suits against gun manufacturers. I think this is a very promising idea. Let’s talk about it soon.” The press release, from the Office of the Mayor of New Orleans, was in draft form, suggesting the Mayor coordinated the strategy with the Clinton White House.
The “promising idea” identified by Blumenthal involved filing massive product liability and negligence lawsuits against major handgun makers, “the opening salvo in a campaign against the gun industry by an alliance of anti-tobacco attorneys and local governments,” wrote The Los Angeles Times. According to one of the lawyers involved in the lawsuits: “We are going to do to [the gun industry] what we did to tobacco. It’s going to be a very large war.”
It became quite clear during Clinton’s watch that they were bent on destroying the gun manufacturing industry.
What Fritton is beginning to uncover are blatant attempts to use strong arm tactics to force gun manufacturers to implement Clinton’s policies on guns – a form of extortion.
Our investigators also uncovered a March 6, 2000 letter from New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer with a handwritten note at the top from Bill Clinton to then-White House Deputy Counsel Bruce Lindsey, which reads: “Bruce, See me re: this…has some good ideas for future.” Among the “good ideas” — denying gun manufacturers the right to sell guns to the military and law enforcement unless they sign an anti-gun “code of conduct” that would cripple the industry.
Clinton and the anti-gun rights crowd used this extortive litigation strategy to strong-arm gun manufacturer Smith and Wesson into adopting some of their policies. President Bush put an end to the federal abuse of the gun industry in 2000. Will a “President Hillary†revert back to government extortion of the gun industry?
These are important issues for gun owners and in particular hunters. As we near the 2008 election for a new president, there are many things that will factor into making a decision. It is not only the work of the past Clinton administration against the gun rights of Americans but also the tactics they used to try and accomplish those goals. I think it would be safe to say that Hillary would employ many of the same thugs in her administration.
Tom Remington
