Crossposted from the Internet Mailing List ONLINE REPORT TO THE FIREARMS
OWNERS COALITION which reprints various columns and news tidbits from
Neal Knox. (who has just moved up from second vice-president to first
vice-president of the NRA)
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                        Roberti's Revenge
                          By NEAL KNOX
     WASHINGTON, D.C. (May 1) -- When California Senate President
Pro Tem David Roberti and Assembly Speaker Pro Tem Mike Roos
pushed through the infamous Roberti-Roos ban on military-look
semi-autos in 1989, gunowners across the state -- and the
nation -- swore they'd get even.
     They did.  Both Roberti and Roos are now out of politics.
But their friends have struck back with an $808,000 fine against
two of the leaders of the fight against them!
     Roos resigned after pro-gun grass roots groups began
stirring up his smelly political past, using an innovative "chain
letter" technique for reaching the voters in his district -- a
system that the politicians couldn't control.
     Then came the big one:  An equally innovative effort to use
an obscure constitutional provision to recall Roberti, the first
recall to get on the ballot since 1914.  Roberti survived the
recall election, but only after expending so much political
capital and campaign funds that he was defeated in his subsequent
campaign to be elected state treasurer.
     Last fall, the California Fair Political Practices
Commission struck back with that grossly unfair $808,000 fine.
     Citizens Against Corruption Executive Director Russ Howard
(who did most of the research on the recall effort) and Assistant
Treasurer Steve Cicero were each saddled with the largest such
political fine in U.S. history -- over five times the total
raised by the committee.
     It wasn't enough to rap CAC, Howard and Cicero the maximum
$2,000 fine for each of the 105 contributors whose names and
donation, but not their addresses, were reported.
     Instead, the FPPC charged one count each for failure to
report the address, occupation, and employer's name.  In many
cases that amounted to a $6,000 fine for initially reporting only
the name and amount of a $100 contribution!
     Russ says there were three main reasons for the initial
reports not being complete:  (1) Many contributions came from
out-of-staters who didn't provide that information; (2) The
inability of a tiny band of amateurs to comply with all the
bureaucratic requirements while attempting to conduct a campaign
and, most importantly:
     (3) Desire to save contributors the harassment that occurred
after names and addresses of supporters of the Roberti recall
were published in local newspapers.
     By double and triple-counting each incomplete report, FPPC
came up with 404 counts at $2,000 each.
     Perhaps it's only coincidence, but Roberti spent some
$800,000 -- almost exactly the amount of the fine -- in defending
against the recall.
     A few days before the recall election Roberti told CBS News:
"They want to send a message to any politician who dares fight
them that they're going to make it so costly and so expensive
that they're not going to fight the gun lobby."
     And I think it's a fair assumption that the California
political establishment, through the FPPC, is now sending an
$808,000 message to grass roots activists who invade their turf,
or figure ways to evade their control and/or give politicians
fits.
     The innovative "chain letter" campaign used against both
Roos and Roberti involved gun owners across the country -- many
of them readers of this column -- who photocopied campaign
material, then used their own envelopes and postage to send it to
registered voters in Roberti's and Roos' districts.
     The recall effort these guys helped pioneer has since been
used three times to recall politicians who angered their
constituents.
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