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Monday, March 04, 2013

Update On House Joint Hearing On HB-294 (Gun Bill)

By Delegate Mike McDermott

(Annapolis)
The House Joint Hearing on HB-294, the Governor’s Gun Bill, continues on into the night and is passing 8-hours of testimony at the time of this writing. Well over a thousand signed up to testify against this bill and only a very few testified in favor of the bill. In fact, except for the “professional” panels that came in support of the governor (about 20 people), everyone else has been opposed.

We have heard from retirees and 10-year olds, people in suits and people in working uniforms, people of great means and people of lesser means, people from Worcester and people from Prince George…all in all, we have heard from Maryland and they do not want this bill passed.

There have been a few good exchanges with some of those who have come in to testify. The governor skated today and did not respond to questions as he had surrounded himself with a large panel providing insulation and the right questions were not asked. The Speaker and Chairmen running the joint committee simply did not allow many questions and he quickly escaped out of the chamber and away from questions.

As of 8:00pm, there were still over 600 hanging around to testify against the bill. Sheriff Lewis joined several other Sheriff’s from around the state and provided passionate testimony before the committee in defense of the 2nd Amendment. In fact, we heard from many in law enforcement who stood with the people’s right to defend themselves as they see fit.

We heard from Beretta Arms who strongly indicated that they would look seriously at moving from Southern Maryland to another state. This echoes what we have heard from other manufacturers of firearms in Maryland. Beretta alone would mean over $400 million to our state coffers.

It was nice to see Worcester State’s Attorney Beau Oglesby in attendance as well. It seems the only support the bill had was from inside the beltway. We will be going well into the early morning hours and may well need to come back later in the day on Saturday to insure that every Marylander who wishes to be heard on this issue is heard.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

McDermott says:

"we have heard from Maryland and they do not want this bill passed".

So, someone please see to it that the House Members are put on notice by their constituents that they will be held accountable if they cave to O'Malley and vote for this bill.

O'Malley doesn't really care about what Maryland wants. He is just pressing the far left agenda with dreams of The White House dancing in his head.

Gary said...

We as Marylander's....outside of the beltway's.....lost our representation quite sometime ago. This should come as no surprise to anyone that lives on the eastern shore or in the western portion of the state.

Anonymous said...

NO, you will not be heard...

NO the right questions won't be asked or answered...

You clearly see they wouldn't allow the questions and they ran out before anything could be talked about for a reason... If they don't hear you say it, it was never said... GO IT???

Besides, only people inside the beltway do they listen to also if your not rich you will not be heard...

Its clear that they do not care about us or listen to us... They will pass this and ignore us... How much more clear does it have to be? you had cops, attorneys, states attorney's, regular people and higher up people say NO to this bill, yet it will pass? Why?

Once it does, what do you plan to do about it? petition it, get it on the ballots to be voted on like the dream act? are you going to ignore it and continue your normal way of life? are the cops going to ignore this and stand with us or are they blowing smoke saying they stand with us yet will enforce the bills law?


Think about this, people who enforced the laws would stand up and say NO to enforcing the laws, then the law isn't a law... Specially if you can't get it enforced...

Just like the govt, you stop working, become self-efficient, they can't take your money and if they have no money the govt doesn't exist... NO ONE WILL WORK FOR FREE, NO ONE... SO if the govt can't take your income because your not working, then they don't get paid and they to will stop...


But no one wants to be self-efficient, no one wants to do things for themselves... This is the problem also...

Anonymous said...

Yeah but O'mally can sure take our tax dollars and send it to his county and make that all nice and perddy whilst we have nothing... While he says he is and has helped and fixed Maryland... NO, he fixed Baltimore county where he is from... nothing else...

lmclain said...

omalley wants to be President. He wants this bill so he parade his bonafides in the next election. THAT'S what this is really all about. His aspirations. And what the actual citizens he SERVES think? He couldn't care less. Like all other politicians. We need some hangings to get their attention back to what they are supposed to be doing. Clue - it AIN'T "whatever they want to do".