Republican Senators Thwart Anti-gun Judicial Nominee

December 14, 2011 by Bob Livingston

Gun owners received something of a reprieve last week when the efforts of Senator Harry Reid to ram through confirmation of an anti-gun judicial nominee were thwarted in a cloture vote.

Reid was pushing Caitlin Halligan, a former New York solicitor general who was a leading advocate for bankrupting the firearms industry through the use of frivolous lawsuits, for a seat on the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. That court is commonly referred to as the second most important in the country.

Democrats voted in lockstep for Halligan. All Republicans save Alaska’s Senator Lisa Murkowski voted against Halligan. Utah’s Senator Orrin Hatch, who’s still trying to play both sides against the middle by supporting tyranny while claiming to be a Tea Partier, voted present.

Meanwhile, we are learning more each day about the insidious nature of the behind-the-scenes efforts of the Administration of President Barack Obama to gin up support of gun control measures by illegally selling guns to Mexican drug traffickers through Operation Fast and Furious.

The government’s assaults on the Constitution continue apace. And don’t forget that the Republican flavor-du-jour Newt Gingrich and his foil Mitt Romney — or Newt Romney, asMichele Bachmann called them — have not signed the National Association for Gun Rights’ Gun Rights Charge. And both Gingrich and Romney have supported strengthening gun laws in the past.