{"id":33905,"date":"2013-01-28T12:05:12","date_gmt":"2013-01-28T18:05:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=33905"},"modified":"2013-10-30T12:22:04","modified_gmt":"2013-10-30T17:22:04","slug":"open-letter-to-rep-betty-mccollum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=33905","title":{"rendered":"Open Letter To Rep. Betty McCollum"},"content":{"rendered":"

To: Rep. Betty McCollum
\nFrom: Mitch Berg, Peasant
\nRe: \u00a0Mission Accomplished!<\/p>\n

Rep. McCollum:<\/p>\n

You had a “Town Hall” meeting deep in the heart of DFL-addled Oakdale yesterday. \u00a0 MNCD4 Conservative<\/a> was there to shoot video.<\/p>\n

And even there, even you couldn’t dodge talking about the Second Amendment .<\/p>\n

Video below the jump, so that the rest of the page can actually load:<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Second Amendment movement – mostly the GOCRA in these parts – had people lined up to attend, as you noted. \u00a0And attend they did.<\/p>\n

I’ll leave out the, er, thorough first question and cut to your response:<\/p>\n

<\/object><\/p>\n

After listing 3,000-odd firearm deaths – murder, accident and suicide – in Minnesota in the past 12 years, you said you want to find “common-sense” ways of bringing that number down.<\/p>\n

Good news, Rep. McCollum! \u00a0The firearm murder rate\u00a0has\u00a0<\/em>come down! \u00a040% in the past 20 years!<\/p>\n

And the number of mass shootings, including in schools, has dropped as well!<\/p>\n

You know that. \u00a0Or…do you?<\/p>\n

Either way – mission accomplished, right?<\/p>\n

And that’s not the only one!<\/p>\n

<\/object><\/p>\n

In the clip above, you say you’d like to make sure that “only the right people recieve” guns purchased over the internet, comparing online gun sales to the old scandal of online wine sales (where kids were buying wine online).<\/p>\n

Again – mission accomplished! \u00a0All transfers via the internet – or even old-fashioned paper catalogs – have to take place via a federally-licensed firearms dealer!<\/p>\n

You knew that, though. \u00a0Right?<\/p>\n

By the way – I’m sure it’s a talking point from Pelosi to try to separate the NRA’s members from Wayne LaPierre (it’s not working<\/a>), but beyond that? \u00a0The fact that you, one of the safest congresscritters there is (so far) have to strenuously show your\u00a0bona fides\u00a0<\/em>as a Second Amendment supporter (if only via your grandfather in Montana) is, in fact, one of the great barometers we have of the Second Amendment Movement’s success. \u00a0Of course, there might be a reason to scuttle away from your NRA ranking (a big fat red F<\/strong><\/span>), too.<\/p>\n

But thanks for pointing out that you’re not Diane Feinstein! \u00a0We’re here to make sure it stays that way!<\/p>\n

We just keep winning these things, don’t we?<\/p>\n

Anyway – I know we all have our limits. For example, when a second guy got up to say the thing that has just got<\/em> to make the DFL nervous – a retired guy describing how this past month’s assault on the Second Amendment has awoken a new activist – I just loved your answer:<\/p>\n

<\/object><\/p>\n

Well, we can’t win ’em all!<\/p>\n

And in this clip:<\/p>\n

<\/object><\/p>\n

Er, perhaps you were mistaken, Rep. McCollum – it was a big meeting and all, and to be fair you were\u00a0<\/em>tap-dancing like Ben Vereen – but the NRA had nothing to do with restricting Congress’ access to mental health records. That’d be HIPPA and a long list of other medical privacy laws – which, to be fair, you’re doing your best to overturn via Obamacare.<\/p>\n

You also note in passing that that<\/em> is why we “need to get the lobbying efforts out of the discussion” – referring to the NRA scorecard (did I mention you have an “F” rating, by the way<\/a>? \u00a0Oh, I think I did; pardon the redundancy). Tell ya what, Representative – you get the teachers union, AFSCME, the SEIU and George Soros to sit down and shut up, and I’ll have a word with the NRA. Deal?<\/p>\n

One last clip: \u00a0a young fellow asked what was your “real agenda” in re the “assault weapons” ban.<\/p>\n

<\/object><\/p>\n

Now, leaving aside the standard rhetorical crutch (yes, you “want a dialog”, gotcha), and the borderline-bizarre topic change (telephone town hall meetings?), I gotta ask – do people\u00a0really\u00a0<\/em>feel safer coming to a town hall meeting than “standing in a grocery store parking lot?”<\/p>\n

OK, you were vamping. \u00a0Gotcha.<\/p>\n

But if there was one theme that you reiterated throughout the meeting, it was that you want to “have an honest discussion” on the issue.<\/p>\n

Excellent!<\/p>\n

Let me – one of your constituents – be the first to invite you on the Northern Alliance Radio Network! \u00a0 We’ll have a very, very honest discussion about this issue – because that’s the only kind of discussion I ever have.<\/p>\n

Oh, unlike Esme Murphy I may not paint your toenails on the air – but it’ll be honest and incisive, along with relentlessly civil!<\/p>\n

Have your people call my people! \u00a0This’ll be fun! \u00a0And honest!<\/p>\n

That is all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To: Rep. Betty McCollum From: Mitch Berg, Peasant Re: \u00a0Mission Accomplished! Rep. McCollum: You had a “Town Hall” meeting deep in the heart of DFL-addled Oakdale yesterday. \u00a0 MNCD4 Conservative was there to shoot video. And even there, even you couldn’t dodge talking about the Second Amendment . Video below the jump, so that the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[155,22],"tags":[270,249],"class_list":["post-33905","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mn-congressional","category-victim-disarmament","tag-2nd-amendment-grass-roots","tag-open-letters"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33905","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33905"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33905\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39419,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33905\/revisions\/39419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33905"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33905"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33905"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}