Political Quotes

“Let me first thank all our colleagues and Senators for being here today speaking about this most important issue for the citizens in each one of our respective States. My question to the Senator from Connecticut is on gun culture. I don't think there is another State--if there is, I don't know--that has more of a gun culture than West Virginia. We take the Second Amendment rights extremely seriously, and I want to make sure we are on the same page because some people come from States that don't have much of a gun culture or weren't exposed to guns as a young person growing up. I can state that in West Virginia, at a very young age, we are taught, first of all, how to handle guns safely. We are taught to never sell our gun to a stranger, never sell a gun to someone who has a criminal background, never sell a gun to someone who is mentally unstable. We don't give our guns to a family member or a friend if we don't think they are responsible. This is how we are taught in our gun culture. I am sure Connecticut has the same gun culture we have. So how this all came about with the amendment 3 years ago, after the horrible, horrific tragedy in Newtown, was that if we respect a law-abiding gun owner who didn't buy the gun because they want to do something wrong with it or they are a criminal or are soon to be a criminal because they own it, then you have to assume they are law-abiding, and they are going to do the right thing.…”