Election Season Officially Begins With Picking of Edwards by Kerry
July 20, 2004

by Joseph P. Tartaro
Executive Editor

For some, especially Democrats and their friends in the media, the 2004 presidential election season began right after the inauguration of George W. Bush in January 2001. For most Americans, it will not begin until after Labor Day this year.

However, for those who see this as a key election in the history of this nation, it began when Sen. John Kerry (MA), the presumed Democratic presidential candidate picked Sen. John Edwards (NC) as his running mate. Polls conducted immediately following the announcement in Pittsburgh, PA, on July 6 indicated that a vast majority of Democrats were very happy with the selection of Edwards, probably because he is more photogenic than Kerry and has a warmer personality.

Kerry is seen as the liberal Brahmin from Massachusetts whose voting record appears to be to the left of the senior senator from that state, Edward M. Kennedy. A graduate of Yale and a member of the Skull and Bones Society at that university, (like President George W. Bush), Kerry married more money and presents a studied manner in speech and dress.

Edwards is promoted as a good old country boy type from working-class roots who is supposed to be a populist, but who became a millionaire as a trial lawyer. He graduated from the University of North Carolina Law School at Chapel Hill and conveys the image of a successful Southerner in contrast to Kerry.

Two-Horse Parlay
Whatever their candidates’ other political positions, the Democrats have locked in a two-horse parlay in which both runners have solid anti-gun voting records. In March, both men abandoned the presidential primary campaign trail long enough to return to Capitol Hill to cast key anti-gun votes. Immediately after voting to renew and expand the Clinton gun and magazine ban and to kill off gun shows with a background check requirement for private transactions, Kerry and Edwards returned to the campaign trail.

Kerry did hang around long enough to get his picture taken with Sens. Charles Schumer (D-NY), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Kennedy. If you saw the picture, which was published in Gun Week’s Mar. 20 issue, you may remember that Kerry was the one giving the thumbs up sign and grinning with the other three anti-gunners.

Kerry has made no bones about his antipathy for the gun rights movement. Even before the Iowa caucuses, he said he didn’t want to be the candidate of the National Rifle Association. (There doesn’t appear to be any chance of that happening.)

But while Kerry and Edwards vote against gunowners at every opportunity, just like Feinstein, Schumer and Kennedy, they profess to be gunowners and supporters of the Second Amendment. I have never figured out exactly how that is possible, but that doesn’t prevent Kerry particularly of having his picture taken on pheasant hunts and other occasions with a shotgun in hand.

But the records of Kerry and Edwards are not the only yardstick for measuring their position on the gun issue. Equally important is the list of their supporters. Among these are such people as billionaire George Soros, who has financed “527” organizations with millions to circumvent the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform law, because as he says, he will do anything to beat George Bush.

Moore’s Film
Another Kerry-Edwards cheerleader is erstwhile filmmaker and author Michael Moore. Like Soros, Moore is one of those people who have never forgiven Bush for beating Gore in 2000, and who began working to defeat him in 2004 almost immediately after Bush was inaugurated.

With the support of Soros and others in the Bush-hating Hollywood community, Moore has bagged all his anti-Bush conspiracy theories into a film which was released this summer in time to impact the presidential race. Called “Fahrenheit 9/11” and billed as a documentary, the Moore flick has played to huge box office while he has been panned by objective critics and political commentators.

I haven’t seen Moore’s film and I don’t intend to. I don’t like Moore because of his past work and his totally unwholesome appearance. But for those who want to know more about the film, or who want to know if anything in it is really true, I offer a couple of recommendations.

One is book by David T. Hardy and Jason Clarke entitled Michael Moore Is a Big Fat Stupid White Man (ReganBooks; ISBN 0-06-076395-7; hardcover; $22.95). Hardy and Clarke dish it back hard to the fervent prophet of the far left, turning a careful eye on Moore’s use of camera tricks and publicity ploys to present his own version of the truth. The book is a scathing case against filmmaker/author Moore that will expose the misrepresentations and hypocrisy that have been characteristic of his career.

“Postwar filmmakers gave us the documentary, Rob Reiner gave us the mockumentary, and Moore initiated a third genre, the crockumentary,” write Clarke and Hardy.

According to reports I have seen, although the book went on sale on June 29 it is already one of the top five sellers among non-fiction at Amazon.com.

Another source for background on Moore and the facts is David Kopel’s article “Fifty-Nine Deceits in Fahrenheit 9/11” which is available on National Review On-line. Kopel reviews Moore’s propaganda style from before the 9/11 attacks through the film, and examines its allegations one by one.

A lot has been written and said about Moore and his latest “crockumentary” but despite that, I expect many people, particularly college-age voters prone to conspiracy theories, to be affected by “Fahrenheit 9/11.” The people who will vote for the Kerry-Edwards ticket because of the film probably would have done so anyway. Maybe a few of them might be first time voters. That’s what Moore, Soros and friends are hoping. Will it be enough to win the election for the anti-gun Democrats? Probably not be itself.

What will affect the outcome of the election is whether or not committed Americans wait until after Labor Day to get involved. A lot is a stake in this election, especially for gunowners who can’t afford to wait till the final days of the campaign.

Percentage Voters
There have been those who have commented in various ways, even in the Gun Week Readers’ Forum that Bush and his Republican majority in the Congress has not been 100% in support of the right to keep and bear arms. Some have suggested that the current Administration can’t be rated better than 70, 80 or 90% pro-gun. They even cite the fact that Bush said on more than one occasion that he would support renewal of the Clinton gun ban, a political position that he adopted early on. But so far Bush has not made renewal and expansion of the ban a priority. Kerry and Edwards have.

And Kerry and Edwards want to shut down gun shows, and would go for national gun registration if elected. Remember that the Kerry-Edwards ticket is 100% anti-gun-rights—the Schumer-Feinstein-Kennedy ticket. If that fact frightens you, it might be prudent to get involved in the 2004 election campaign immediately.

How? By talking with your fellow hunters, shooting and collecting club members, family and co-workers. Let them know what you know. More importantly, find out if they are registered to vote and help them to get registered. It’s easier than everyone thinks. And if they don’t vote, remind them that they can’t complain about the outcome later. That privilege is reserved for people who took their rights and obligations seriously and anted up their own vote.

On Nov. 2, the election will be decided by people who became educated voters, who registered to vote, and who actually got out and voted. The other won’t count.