Subject: [big campaign] Tracking Update: McCain Speech in Louisville, KY
From: "Andres Moreno" <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 16 May 2008 19:14:03 -0400
List-Id: <bigcampaign.googlegroups.com>

Just off the phone with our tracker Jacob Roberts who was on the ground
today in Louisville, KY.  Below are the notes from our call.

Louisville, KY - McCain Speech at National Rifle Association Annual Meeting

*Big Highlights:* McCain asserts he is not Barack Obama. Highlights his long
standing support of the second amendment. Attacks assault weapons ban, and
proclaims that a President Obama or President Clinton would put gun rights
at risk. Continues to remark on Bush's 'appeasement' comments in Israel, and
speaks on Iraq war and strict constructionist judges.

*Background Details*
- McCain was preceded by the playing of a McCain ad highlighting the
2ndamendment and victory in Iraq. – included clip of last year's
address where
he yelled at anti-war protesters
- Audience Size: approximately 1,000
- The crowd warmed up to him as he spoke about gun rights, and judges
- The audience left by the dozens as he began to speak about the war in Iraq

- McCain came off as nervous and unsettled – stumbled reading off yet
another huge teleprompter
- Secret Service Everywhere, Metal Detectors Used
-  McCain appeared from off stage, after speech he walked the ropes with
Cindy shaking audience hands

*Major Speakers Tracked:*
John McCain
John Bolton
Mitt Romney
Mitch McConnell

*Press: *
- Local Press – (Definitely Fox and CBS – others most assuredly there)
- CNN – Dana Bash
- Carl Cameron may have been there

*Link to transcript:*
http://www.standardnewswire.com/news/239202741.html

*
*

*Transcript:*

It is a pleasure to be here this afternoon. I know you have heard from a
number of my friends and colleagues today -- Governors Huckabee and Romney,
Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, Ambassador John Bolton, and Kentucky's own,
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell. And you have heard from an
American hero, Greg Stubbe, who sacrificed greatly so that Americans might
be secure in our freedom. We wish him well in his recovery.

At the outset, let me recognize the life of a great American, Charlton
Heston. All Americans remember him as a great actor, and for the memorable
roles he played. Many of us also remember him as a man who stood up for the
oppressed. He marched for civil rights in the 1960s. And his firm commitment
to defending the constitutional rights of Americans -- all Americans and all
constitutional rights -- led him to serve as President of the NRA. It was
not a popular stand at the time with many of his friends in Hollywood, but
his principles mattered more to him than popularity. We will miss Charlton
Heston, and we can best honor him by honoring the good he did and the causes
he served.

When I first ran for Congress in 1982, I was proud to have the support of
gun owners. For more than two decades, I've opposed efforts to ban guns, ban
ammunition, ban magazines, and dismiss gun owners as some kind of fringe
group unwelcome in "modern" America. The Second Amendment isn't some archaic
custom that matters only to rural Americans, who find solace in firearms out
of frustration with their economic circumstances. The Second Amendment is
unique in the world. It guarantees an individual right to keep and bear
arms. To argue anything else is to reject the clear meaning of our Founding
Fathers.

Self-reliance is the ethic that made America great, and our Founders
understood that. They knew there would be circumstances where Americans
might need to use firearms to protect themselves and their families. Some
Second Amendment detractors think this is a mere abstraction, or a relic of
America's distant past. But Americans exercise their Second Amendment rights
every day to protect themselves from criminals, as happened in Scottsdale,
Arizona where earlier this year, a 74-year-old woman defended her home from
a man who repeatedly attempted to break in, extort money and threatened to
set fire to her garage. The Second Amendment -- and its guarantee of an
individual right to keep and bear arms -- is certainly not an abstraction.

But the clear meaning of the Second Amendment has not stopped those who want
to punish firearms owners -- and those who make and sell firearms -- for the
actions of criminals. It seems like every time there is a particularly
violent crime, the anti-gun activists demand yet another restriction on the
Second Amendment. I opposed the ban on so-called "assault weapons," which
was first proposed after a California schoolyard shooting. It makes no sense
to ban a class of firearms based on cosmetic features. I have opposed
waiting periods for gun purchases.

I have opposed efforts to cripple our firearms manufacturers by making them
liable for the acts of violent criminals. This was a not-so-cleverly
disguised effort by some to use lawsuits to bankrupt gun manufacturers. They
sued gun manufacturers to hold them legally responsible for the actions of
lawbreakers. Had they prevailed, they would have bankrupted manufacturers,
driven the costs of guns and ammunition sky high, and forced government and
military customers to buy from foreign sources.

Like your members, I am a committed conservationist. I have long supported
multiple uses for public lands that ensure they are available for this and
future generations to hunt, fish and explore. Over 12 million hunters in the
United States contribute $25 billion to the economy, much of it in rural
areas. Hunters pay billions of dollars in federal revenue through license
and other fees. Here in Kentucky, hunters spend over $400 million and
support thousands of jobs. Senators Obama and Clinton claim they support our
hunting heritage, but they voted to allow lawsuits that would force American
gunmakers out of business and to ban ammunition commonly used for hunting.
Their votes reveal their real views -- far more than their occasional
statements of theoretical support for the Second Amendment heard on the
campaign trail.

Over the years, I haven't agreed with the NRA on every issue. I have
supported efforts to have NICS background checks apply to gun sales at gun
shows. I recognize that gun shows are enjoyed by millions of law-abiding
Americans. I do not support efforts by those who seek to regulate them out
of existence. But I believe an accurate, fair and instant background check
at guns shows is a reasonable requirement. I also oppose efforts to require
federal regulation of all private sales such as the transfer between a
father and son or husband and wife. I supported campaign finance reform
because I strongly believed our system of financing campaigns was
influencing elected officials to put the interests of "soft money" donors
ahead of the public interest. It is neither my purpose nor the purpose of
the legislation to prevent gun owners or any other group of citizens from
making their voices heard in the legislative process.

Those disagreements do not detract from my long record of support for the
Second Amendment and the work we have done together to protect the rights of
gun owners from the political attitudes of the moment in Washington that
view the Second Amendment as a once quaint custom that must now yield to the
judgment of modern enlightened opinion. We have real differences with the
Democratic candidates for President. They have learned something since 2000.
They don't talk about their plans for gun control. They claim to support
hunters and gun owners. But just because they don't talk about gun control
doesn't mean they won't support gun control. Let's be clear. If either
Senator Clinton or Senator Obama is elected President, the rights of
law-abiding gun owners will be at risk. They have both voted as Senators to
ban guns or ban ammunition or to allow gun makers to be sued out of
existence.

It seems every election, politicians who support restrictions on the Second
Amendment dress up in camouflage and pose with guns to demonstrate they care
about hunters, even though few gun owners fall for such obvious political
theater. After Senator Obama made his unfortunate comment that
Pennsylvanians "cling to guns and religion" out of bitterness, Senator
Clinton quickly affirmed her support for the Second Amendment. That drew
Senator Obama's derision. "She's running around talking about how this is an
insult to sportsmen, how she values the Second Amendment," he said. "Like
she's on the duck blind every Sunday, packin' a six shooter!" Someone should
tell Senator Obama that ducks are usually hunted with shotguns.

Senator Obama hopes he can get away with having it both ways. He says he
believes that the Second Amendment confers an individual right to bear arms.
But when he had a chance to weigh in on the most important Second Amendment
case before the U.S. Supreme Court in decades, District of Columbia v.
Heller, Senator Obama dodged the question by claiming, "I don't like taking
a stand on pending cases." He refused to sign the amicus brief signed by a
bipartisan group of 55 Senators arguing that the Supreme Court should
overturn the DC gun ban in the Heller case. When he was running for the
State Senate in Illinois, his campaign filled out a questionnaire asking
whether he supported legislation to ban the manufacture, sale and possession
of handguns with simple, "Yes."

The Heller case should be decided soon. But however that case is decided,
the federal judiciary will continue to be an important forum for protecting
Second Amendment rights. The next President will appoint literally hundreds
of federal judges, and is likely to have the opportunity to nominate one or
more Supreme Court justices.

In America, the constitutional restraint on power is as fundamental as the
exercise of power, and often more so. Yet the Framers knew these restraints
would not always be observed. They were idealists, but they were worldly men
as well, and they knew that abuses of power and efforts to encroach on
individual rights would arise and need to be firmly checked. Their design
for democracy was drawn from their experience with tyranny. A suspicion of
power is ingrained in both the letter and spirit of the American
Constitution.

In the end, of course, their grand solution was to allocate federal power
three ways, reserving all other powers and rights to the states and to the
people themselves. The executive, legislative, and judicial branches are
often wary of one another's excesses, seeking to keep each other within
bounds. The framers knew exactly what they were doing, and the system of
checks and balances rarely disappoints.

Quite rightly, the proper role of the judiciary has become one of the
defining issues of this presidential election. It will fall to the next
president to nominate qualified men and women to the federal courts, and the
choices we make will reach far into the future. My two prospective opponents
and I have very different ideas about the nature and proper exercise of
judicial power. We would nominate judges of a different kind, a different
caliber, a different understanding of judicial authority and its limits. And
the people of America -- voters in both parties whose wishes and convictions
are so often disregarded by unelected judges -- are entitled to know what
those differences are.

Federal courts are charged with applying the Constitution and laws of our
country to each case at hand. But a court is hardly competent to check the
abuses of other branches of government if it cannot control its own judicial
activism.

Real activists seek to make their case democratically -- to win hearts,
minds, and majorities to their cause. Such people throughout our history
have often shown great idealism and done great good. By contrast, activist
lawyers and activist judges follow a different method. They want to be
spared the inconvenience of campaigns, elections, legislative votes, and all
of that. Some federal judges operate by fiat, shrugging off generations of
legal wisdom and precedent while expecting their own opinions to go
unquestioned.

The decisions of our Supreme Court in particular can be as close to
permanent as anything government does. And in the presidential selection of
those who will write those decisions, a hunch, a hope, and a good first
impression are not enough. I will not seek the confidence of the American
people in my nominees until my own confidence is complete -- until I am
certain of my nominee's ability, wisdom, and demonstrated fidelity to the
Constitution.

There are many other differences between my views and Senator Obama's. I
favor lower taxes, less government spending, and less federal bureaucracy.
Senator Obama has clearly stated his preference for raising the tax burden
on Americans, increasing government spending and giving the government more
authority over the lives of American families and businesses. We have
differences on health care. I prefer to give American families more control
over their health care decisions. Senator Obama would prefer the government
exercise greater control. Senator Obama would meet unconditionally with some
of the world's worst dictators and state sponsors of terrorists. I would not
add to the prestige of those who support violent extremists or seek to
destroy our allies.

But I would like to close my remarks with an issue that I know is much on
the mind of Americans -- the war in Iraq. Senator Obama has said, if
elected, he will withdraw Americans from Iraq quickly no matter what the
situation on the ground is and no matter what U.S. military commanders
advise. But if we withdraw prematurely from Iraq, al Qaeda in Iraq will
survive, proclaim victory and continue to provoke sectarian tensions that,
while they have been subdued by the success of the surge, still exist, and
are ripe for provocation by al Qaeda. Civil war in Iraq could easily descend
into genocide, and destabilize the entire region as neighboring powers come
to the aid of their favored factions. A reckless and premature withdrawal
would be a terrible defeat for our security interests and our values. Iran
will view it as a victory, and the biggest state supporter of terrorists, a
country with nuclear ambitions and a stated desire to destroy the Sta te of
Israel, will see its influence in the Middle East grow significantly.

The consequences of our defeat would threaten us for years, and those who
argue for premature withdrawal, as both Senators Obama and Clinton do, are
arguing for a course that would eventually draw us into a wider and more
difficult war that would entail far greater dangers and sacrifices than we
have suffered to date. Thanks to the counterinsurgency instigated by General
Petreaus, after four years of terribly costly mistakes, we have a realistic
chance to succeed in helping the forces of political reconciliation prevail
in Iraq, and the democratically elected Iraqi Government, with a
professional and competent Iraqi army, impose its authority throughout the
country and defend its borders. We have a realistic chance of denying al
Qaeda any sanctuary in Iraq. We have a realistic chance of leaving behind in
Iraq a force for stability and peace in the region, and not a cause for a
wider and far more dangerous war. I do not argue against withdrawal bec ause
I am indifferent to war and the suffering it inflicts on too many American
families. I hold my position because I hate war, and I know very well and
very personally how grievous its wages are. But I know, too, that we must
sometimes pay those wages to avoid paying even higher ones later. I want our
soldiers home, too, just as quickly as we can bring them back without
risking everything they suffered for, and burdening them with greater
sacrifices in the years ahead. That I will not do. I have spent my life in
service to my country, and I will never, never, never risk her security for
the sake of my own ambitions. I will defend her, and all her freedoms, so
help me God. And I ask you to help me in that good cause. Thank you, and God
bless you.

-- 
Andres Moreno
Deputy Director - Tracking/Media Monitoring
Progressive Media USA
202-609-7688 (office)
703-501-6661 (cell)
[email-masked]

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