The Most Dangerous Woman In America?

She's a gray-haired 78 year-old who stands less than 5 feet tall, and she just may be the most dangerous woman in America.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/03/05/the-nra-lobbyist-behind-floridas-pro-gun-policies

Her name is Marion Hammer.  As the state's NRA's lobbyist, she has spent the past 40 years turning Florida into arguably the deadliest, gun-craziest state in the union.  Her outsized influence has grown to the point where she gives orders, and the state's employees, legislators and governor follow them.  She uses her email list of 2 to 3 million people to blitz her followers with frequent flaming updates on which politicians have been "loyal" to her guns-first dogma, and those who've dared to commit "treacherous, traitorous betrayals."  Says Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz (R), "If you're with Marion ninety-five per cent of the time, you're a damn traitor."

For the past twenty years, Florida's state legislature has been completely controlled by Republicans.  Bills attempting to advance even the tiniest of gun reforms are rare and go nowhere.  Meanwhile, GOP legislators vie for the honor of carrying her water.  Essentially, Marion the Lobbyist writes the most gun-permissive bills in the nation, and conservative lawmakers slavishly serve as her fig-leaf "sponsors."  Since 1998, thirty of Hammer's bills have been signed into law.  They include some real doozies:

-- The country's first concealed-carry permit law.
-- The country's first stand-your-ground (shoot now, think later) self-defense law.
-- A law allowing people without permits to carry concealed weapons during "emergencies."
-- A law prohibiting doctors, when assessing potential health hazards, from asking parents of small children if they owned guns.
-- A law punishing local officials who try to pass gun regulations stricter than those imposed by the state.  Violators are subject to heavy fines and removal from office.  (Mess with Marion and lose your job.)

According to David Cole, ACLU legal director, Florida is often the first place the NRA pursues its bloody priorities, "relying on Hammer to set a precedent that can then be exported to other states."

Which makes it a minor miracle that the Florida legislature passed a minor gun reform bill last week over Marion Hammer's strenuous objections, and that Gov. Voldemort actually signed it.

Here's hoping her heinous run is done!

Marion, now is the time! 
(For you to go away)

#FuckTheNRA