Author warns state, federal gun-control candidates of being hit by Brady Effect

One piece of political e-mail I received last week piqued my interest.

It was titled, “Democrats should fear the Brady Effect,” written Oct. 29 by Brad O’Leary for the Web site of American Thinker. O’Leary played on an election concept known as the Bradley Effect, where whites tell pollsters they will support a black candidate but cast ballots for a white candidate once inside the voting booth. It is named after Tom Bradley, a black candidate who lost his bid for California governor in 1982.

O’Leary writes that it is not the Bradley Effect that supporters of Barack Obama should fear but rather the Brady Effect. This named for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, which has endorsed candidates who agree with its goal of “passing sensible gun laws.”

It isn’t the ‘Bradley effect’ Democrats should fear, but something else. Call it the ‘Brady effect,’ named after the one of the radical gun-ban lobbies in America, the Brady Campaign,” O’Leary writes. “In 1982, gun-banners were successful in placing an initiative on the California ballot dubbed Proposition 15, which would have essentially banned handgun sales and mandated gun registration statewide. Bradley supported the handgun ban and his opponent, George Deukmejian, opposed it. Polls showed that Prop 15 enjoyed early support in the campaign season. But that wouldn’t last.

“The National Rifle Association, in partnership with California state and local gun rights groups and grass-roots activists, sprang into action, educating voters about the dangers of Prop 15 and how their Second Amendment rights hung in the balance,” O’Leary writes. “By Election Day, Prop 15 had gone from having majority support to being radioactive. Not only did Republicans oppose it but so did Reagan Democrats and an overwhelming majority of the state’s law enforcement community. … Proposition 15 lost by a whopping 63 percent to 37 percent, and polls after the election showed that a clear majority of Californians who voted ‘no’ on Prop 15 also voted against Tom Bradley in favor of George Deukmejian.”

The Brady Campaign announced that it has endorsed (among other federal and state candidates) Barack Obama for president, Joe Biden for vice president (over the John McCain/Sarah Palin ticket), 6th Congressional District candidate Jill Morgenthaler (over U.S. Rep. Peter Roskam), 10th Congressional District candidate U.S. Rep. Mark Kirk (over Dan Seals) and 46th Illinois House District candidate Gary Nowak (over state Rep. Dennis Reboletti).

The campaign’s latest endorsement is for 13th Congressional District candidate Scott Harper (over Steve Alesch and U.S. Rep. Judy Biggert).

“Scott Harper has proven himself to be a strong advocate for his community as a successful small business owner, workers’ rights advocate, and volunteer tutor and mentor,” Paul Helmke, president of the Brady Campaign, said in an e-mail. “He understands the need to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people, and he will fight to keep our families safe by supporting common sense gun laws in Congress.”

Between the economy, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and how to approach tax policy, I’m not certain where the issue of gun control is going to fit in the minds of voters. Protecting gun rights is very important, so I think this should weigh heavily on the electorate.

But there’s quite a bit for everyone to take in while pondering their election choices. We’ll know tomorrow night how much the gun issue played into Election ’08.

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Previous post short-changed plans of Green Party candidate

Boy is my face red.

Last weekend I submitted a post that included reactions from candidates running against members of the U.S. House of Representatives regarding the $700 billion bailout plan. Steve Alesch of Warrenville is the Green Party candidate running in the 13th Congressional District. In a comment he posted following my post, he pointed out a few errors I made.

First of all, I referred to the Green “Park” rather than the Green Party. Maybe I hadn’t yet gotten any coffee when I wrote at bit.

He also remarked that I referred to articles on his Web site about the proposed bailout plan as “general,” contending that he offered specifics. As it turns out, he did; I underestimated what his two articles contained.

On the homepage of his Web site, his postings appeared under the headlines “Forget bailouts: Alesch outlines alternative energy economy” and “The financial meltdown requires far-reaching green solutions, Green Party leaders say“; they both had tabs to continue reading the entire articles. I neglected to notice this and believed the three or four paragraphs that appeared were the entire postings.

I was wrong and apologize to Alesch for short-changing his work. Viewers are encouraged to link to his postings and read the complete context of his plans.

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Candidates react to House member votes on bailout package

While eating breakfast this morning, I couldn’t decide which part of the newspaper I was reading was depressing me the most: the news section, the business section or the sports section. It was all pretty much a downer.

Oh well, life goes on. And our government goes on. And on, and on, and on …

There were a few hundred million dollars worth of goodies in the $700 billion bailout package signed into law yesterday. For all the talk about how necessary this legislation was to stabilize the financial markets and thwart further harm to taxpayers, lawmakers can’t resist bulking it up with pork.

That’s Washington for you.

For our newspaper Web sites, I wrote an article today about how U.S. Reps. Judy Biggert, R-13th District, of Hinsdale; Bill Foster, D-14th District, of Geneva; Dan Lipinski, D-3rd District, of Western Springs; and Peter Roskam, R-6th District, of Wheaton voted yesterday on the bailout package and why they voted this way. To allow voters to compare and contrast, I’m going to highlight the positions of those running against these members of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Let’s start with how each House member voted. Biggert switched her position and voted for the legislation; Foster maintained his support for it and voted to approve the measure. Both Lipinski and Roskam continued to oppose the bill and voted against it.

Republican Michael Hawkins and Green Party candidate Jerome Pohlen are challenging Lipinski in the 3rd Congressional District. While both have Web sites dedicated to their campaigns, neither had posted anything regarding the bailout legislation.

Jill Morgenthaler of Des Plaines is the Democratic challenger running against Roskam in the 6th Congressional District. She said she would have voted for the bailout package.

A posting on her Web site read, “Congressman Peter Roskam has been AWOL in the effort to shape a financial market rescue over the past few weeks. According to his challenger, … Roskam has failed his constituents. Illinois’ 6th District has a seat on the Financial Services Committee. But while other members of Congress were hard at work trying to come up with a plan to save the retirement plans of millions of Americans, to salvage the credit lines necessary to keep small businesses functioning and to keep the American financial markets from crumbling, Peter Roskam sat on his hands, proving yet again that he is not able to reach across the aisle to get things done.”

Steve Alesch of Warrenville is the Green Party candidate for the 13th Congressional District, while Scott Harper of Lockport is the Democratic challenger. Harper criticized Biggert’s previous vote against the bailout package on his Web site. But since Biggert ended up voting for the legislation yesterday, it’s uncertain how Harper would have reacted since he didn’t update his Web site with comments about the most recent vote.

On his Web site, Alesch doesn’t specifically address yesterday’s vote. Rather he offers a few general postings (titled “Forget bailouts: Alesch outlines alternative energy economy” and “The financial meltdown requires far-reaching green solutions, Green Party leaders say“) about the need for green alternatives. (Update: In a comment about this post, Green Party candidate Steve Alesch challenges my assertion that his Web postings were “general,” and indeed he is right. Read his comments following this post, and see a new post I’ve made Oct. 10 explaining my error. I appreciate Alesch pointing out my mistake.)

“Instead of bromides, unconvincing reassurances and ineffective half-measures that we’re hearing from John McCain and Barack Obama and their fellow Republicans and Democrats, we need to take drastic steps. We need green measures to fix a system that doesn’t work,” Alesch said in one of his postings.

Jim Oberweis of Sugar Grove is the Republican candidate for the 14th Congressional District. In a statement on his Web site released Wednesday, he said he supported House members who voted against the bailout plan.

“I would have voted against the bailout legislation that was before the House on Monday,” Oberweis said in his statement. “And the fact of the matter is, no matter what the House leadership might do today and tomorrow to gussy it up, the core idea — using taxpayer funds to buy bad assets — is so fundamentally flawed that there’s just no way to make good sense of that.”

So that’s what the candidates had to say. What do you think? Leave a comment.

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