CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb
By Dave Workman
Senior Editor
Just days before the New York primary, the Washington Post “Fact Checker” handed Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton a nasty slap by giving her “Three Pinocchios” – which translates to a bald-faced fib – for creating a “misleading impression” that a major source of illegal guns in the Empire State is neighboring Vermont.
The Fact Checker detailed how this false flag story was created over the course of several days, in an apparent effort to discredit rival Sen. Bernie Sanders, who represents the Green Mountain State. Clinton has made gun control a central plank in her campaign for the White House, and she has repeatedly criticized Sanders for his positions on guns.
But Clinton told a Long Island round table forum audience that, “Here’s what I want you to know: Most of the guns that are used in crimes and violence and killings in New York come from out of state. The state that has the highest per-capita number of those guns that end up committing crime in New York come from Vermont,” according to a published report.
That was enough to get the Fact Checker’s attention, and to also elicit a reaction from the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms.
“From her tale of landing under fire from snipers to her email controversy, Hillary Clinton has created an aura of dishonesty,” CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb observed. “She crafted this meme to discredit rival Bernie Sanders, who represents Vermont in the Senate. It is dishonest and it reminds people why a Washington Post/ABC News poll said 57 percent of the people don’t think she is honest or trustworthy.”
The Fact Checker noted in its analysis of the Clinton claim that, “Clinton has carefully crafted her talking point to find the particular government data that support her point, which gives a wildly different view than how trafficking flows are tracked. We do not find the per capita measure as a fair assessment of gun flows from Vermont into New York. The difference between this point using per capita calculation and the raw number (1 percent of crime guns with source states identified in 2014 came from Vermont) is so stark that it creates a significantly misleading impression to the public.”
The critique also contended, “The number of crime guns in New York from Vermont is so small that it could even be attributed to one or two bad actors. Using the per capita measure of trafficked guns originating from Vermont is as pointless as counting guns trafficked per 100,000 head of cattle.”
Gottlieb suggested that this campaign tactic was an attempt to convince voters of something that wasn’t there.
“New Yorkers should think about this as their primary looms next week,” he said. “This is the kind of political sleight of hand that one expects from a person who could not say for sure if she’s ever lied to the American people.”
