BELLEVUE, WA – A report from MSNBC Tuesday that “more officers are being killed in traffic accidents” than by guns leaves the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) wondering, “Where’s Ted Kennedy on this threat to the police?”
Senator Kennedy was pointman during recent debate on gun legislation in the Senate, arguing for more restrictions on firearms and so-called “cop-killer bullets.” That legislation, to protect gun makers from frivolous junk lawsuits, passed despite the senator’s hysteria-laden rhetoric.
“As recently as 2003,” said SAF Founder Alan Gottlieb, “more cops were killed by cars than guns, according to the MSNBC report. Where’s Ted Kennedy and why isn’t he demanding that auto makers be sued into financial oblivion, the same way he wants America’s gun industry to be devastated?
“If anybody is an authority on lethal car crashes,” Gottlieb said, “it would be Ted Kennedy, whose carelessness in July 1969 cost the life of Mary Jo Kopechne, a passenger in the car that Kennedy drove off of a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island. She drowned, and Kennedy fled the scene. It’s no wonder why so many gun owners in this country have bumper stickers affixed to their cars and trucks declaring ‘Ted Kennedy’s car has killed more people than my gun’.”
For years, Ted Kennedy has been one of Capitol Hill’s most shrill voices on the gun control issue, Gottlieb noted. During the recent gun legislation debate, Kennedy repeatedly called for bans on so-called “cop killer bullets” even though not one police officer wearing body armor has ever been killed by such a bullet. Kennedy harshly criticized gun rights advocacy groups for opposing his legislation, calling such opposition a “national disgrace.”
“Ted Kennedy has proven himself to be somewhat an expert on the subject of national disgraces, as his own personal conduct over the years would attest,” Gottlieb said. “He should be more careful throwing that term around, rather like the rock-throwing man who lives in a glass house.
“If he wants to save police lives,” Gottlieb concluded, “Sen. Kennedy should forget about guns and bullets, and direct all of his attention to vehicle safety, and punishing criminals who used their cars as lethal weapons. The only thing Kennedy has to fear from gun owners is their long memories about his past.”