Archive for October 2008
It’s Time For Action!!!!!!
We as gun owners must take the time to become engaged in the process of preserving our rights. Let’s make sure we vote!!
Dedicated to education, safety training and support
of Illinois firearm owners
October 10, 2008
Fellow Sportsman,
Hello, my name is Rich Pearson and I have been active in the firearm rights movement for over 40 years. For the past 15 years, I have served in the Illinois state capitol as the chief lobbyist for the Illinois State Rifle Association. I lobbied Barack Obama extensively while he was an Illinois State Senator. As a result of that experience, I know Obama’s attitudes toward guns and gun owners better than anyone. The truth be told, in all my years in the Capitol I have never met a legislator who harbors more contempt for the law-abiding firearm owner than
Barack Obama.
Although Obama claims to be an advocate for the 2nd Amendment, his voting record in the Illinois Senate paints
a very different picture. While a state senator, Obama voted for a bill that would ban nearly every hunting rifle, shotgun and target rifle owned by Illinois citizens. That same bill would authorize the state police to raid homes of gun owners and forcibly confiscate banned guns. Obama supported a bill that would shut down law-abiding firearm manufacturers including Springfield Armory, Armalite, Rock River Arms and Les Baer. Obama also voted for a bill that would prohibit law-abiding citizens from purchasing more than one gun per month. Without a doubt, Barack Obama has proven himself to be an enemy of the law abiding firearm owner. At the same time, Obama has proven himself to be a friend to the hardened criminal. While a state senator, Obama voted 4 times against legislation that would allow a homeowner to use a firearm in defense of home and family. Does Barack Obama still sound to you like a “friend” of the law-abiding gun owner? nd speaking of friends, you can always tell a person by the company they keep. Obama counts among his friends the Rev. Michael Pfleger – a renegade Chicago priest who has openly called for the murder of gun shop owners and pro-gun legislators. Then there is his buddy Richard Daley, the mayor of Chicago who has declared that if it were up to him, nobody would be allowed to own a gun. And let’s not forget Obama’s pal George Soros – the guy who has pumped millions of dollars into the UN’s international effort to disarm law-abiding citizens.
Obama has shown that he is more than willing to use other people’s money to fund his campaign to take your guns away from you. While a board member of the leftist Joyce Foundation, Barack Obama wrote checks for tens of millions of dollars to extremist gun control organizations such as the Illinois Council Against Handgun iolence and the Violence Policy Center. Does Barack Obama still sound to you like a “friend” of the law-abiding gun owner? By now, I’m sure that many of you have received mailings from an organization called “American Hunters
Sincerely,
(original signed)
Richard A. Pearson
Executive Director
Illinois State Rifle Association
Open Letter to Sportsmen:10/10/08:page 2
nd
Better Think About This!!!!!!!!!
Out In Front Of Bishop’s Creek Catching Walleyes!!!!!!!!!!!
Wilkinson admitted to Halsne that she is a felon
The Secretary of State’s Office fired up a new multimillion-dollar computer in 2006. Its job was to catch, and then cancel, illegal voters.
Well, not all illegal voters.
KIRO-TV recently ran its own data to double check the state’s work. Investigative Reporter Chris Halsne found out the system was set up to ignore the existence of approximately 24,000 convicted felons.
The State of Washington never stopped sending Tracy Wilkinson ballots in the mail, even though it appears she’s not eligible to vote.
In 2002, she pleaded guilty to a felony prescription drug charge, then, according to court files, failed to pay all her fines.
A Snohomish County judge ruled “the defendant is not entitled to restoration of civil rights or discharge” – legal speak for “you can’t vote!”
Wilkinson admitted to Halsne that she is a felon, but thought she could still legally vote.
Halsne: “You’re a convicted felon?”
Wilkinson: “Yeah. I am. I fought it, but they said no jail. So, then, it really never bothered me because I thought, well, I’m never going to be president, so I don’t care. Really. Then, when you brought up that I’m not supposed to vote, they send me my ballots. I’ve been voting for the last 10 years. “
An extensive computer analysis, independently conducted by KIRO Team 7 Investigators, found that Wilkinson is just one of 23,927 criminals on the active voter database.
6,812 of them are considered “very likely voters” because they already cast a ballot in other elections this year.
Unless something changes soon, every one of the felons will get a ballot for the November election, even though the state admits it has no idea if they are eligible.
Sources familiar with the election program, who asked we not identify them, tell us the new computer system was intentionally programmed to ignore a certain subset of felony data. The reasoning behind it was this: Because most of the felons on our list committed their crimes prior to the computer going online in 2006, it was going to be too difficult to research which ones can legally vote.
Jonathan Bechtle is an attorney at a conservative think tank, the Evergreen Freedom Foundation. He thinks we have found a significant flaw and one that could affect a close election.
“So we’re not going to follow the law because it seems too hard to do? Sorry. That just doesn’t cut it. The law says ‘felons, you can’t vote.’ The Secretary has been given the authority, given the funds to put this database together. They should be able to do this,” said Bechtle.
Washington’s convicted felons can’t legally vote until two things happen. First, they must meet all of their court ordered conditions: Prison time, restitution, the works. Then, depending on the year, that felon also needs a judge to sign an order of discharge or restoration of civil rights.
A long-term study by the Washington Department of Corrections shows that about 65 percent of felons fail to pay off all their restitution or finish their court ordered conditions.
Using admittedly simplistic math, if our data shows 6,812 felons voted in primary elections this year, that means 65 percent of them or about 4,400 will illegally cast ballots in November.
If all active voters who also appear to be convicted felons are counted, that’s more than 15,000 questionable votes.
Secretary of State Sam Reed is proud his office purged 40,000 dead, duplicate, underage, and non-citizen voters off the rolls since 2006. However, he admits that the felon issue remains a problem.
“They have so many people out there that have not completed their sentences. It’s almost impossible for us to track that, but we are working with the courts to do it, but that is one of our challenges,” said Reed.
For Tracy Wilkinson, her answer is simple. It also happens to be the same thought process being used by the Secretary of State’s Office: Let all criminals vote if they aren’t actually sitting in prison, jail, or under active supervision of the Department of Corrections.
“As long as they’re paying taxes, being part of the community and doing what they’re supposed to be doing, they should have the right to vote,” said Wilkinson.
One thing is very clear: The whole system for tracking felons is a mess. We found thousands of data entry errors, including questions regarding whether certain criminals (including Tracy Wilkinson) were convicted of felonies or gross misdemeanors or both.
Because of those discrepancies, elections officials don’t think it’s “practical” to eliminate any of the 24,000 or so felons in question. Instead, all will be handed ballots for the upcoming primary election.
Take A Look
Finally!!
WASHINGTON – Pending home sales rose 7.4 percent from July to August, an unexpected piece of positive news for the battered U.S. housing market.
The National Association of Realtors said Wednesday its seasonally adjusted index of pending sales for existing homes rose to 93.4 from an upwardly revised July reading of 87. The reading was the highest since June 2007.
Home sales are considered pending when the seller has accepted an offer, but the deal has not yet closed. Typically there is a one- to two-month lag before a sale is completed.
Wall Street economists surveyed by Thomson/IFR had predicted the index would fall to 84.9.
The index, which sunk to a record low of 83 in March, stood at 85.8 in August 2007.
Sales are picking up in places that have seen the most severe declines in housing prices — including California, Florida Nevada and Arizona, plus Rhode Island and the Washington, D.C. area, said Lawrence Yun, the trade group’s chief economist. Still, Yun does not expect home prices to rebound until next year and only expects a modest gain of 2 to 3 percent in 2009.
A major unknown is how the worldwide financial crisis and economic slump will affect the housing market.
Despite numerous efforts by the Federal Reserve to encourage banks to lend more, lenders have kept tight reins on mortgage lending, and average rates on 30-year mortgages have remained over 6 percent for most of the year.
The latest effort by the central bank came Wednesday, when the Fed and six other major central banks around the world slashed interest rates Wednesday in an attempt to prevent a mushrooming financial crisis from becoming a global economic meltdown.
The Fed reduced a key rate from 2 percent to 1.5 percent. In Europe, which also has been hard hit by the financial crisis, the Bank of England cut its rate by half a point to 4.5 percent and the European Central Bank sliced its rate by half a point to 3.75 percent. Also cutting rates were the central banks of China, Canada, Sweden, and Switzerland.
There’s no guarantee, though, that mortgage rates will match the Fed’s cut.
That’s because long-term interest rates, which influence 30-year mortgages, don’t always move in sync with the Fed’s action, which lowered the interest rate banks charge each other on overnight loans.
However, the Fed action will reduce borrowing costs almost immediately for U.S. bank customers whose home equity and other floating-rate loans are tied to the prime interest rate. Bank of America, Wells Fargo and other banks cut their prime rate by half a point to 4.5 percent after the Fed announcement.
