Freedom Was A Winner On Election Day

Some electoral wins you may have missed

Posted on November 18, 2016 by Bob Livingstonfreedom 

There were some big wins on election day that may be getting lost in the euphoria resulting from the humiliating crash of the Clinton mafia and its enablers.

First; gun rights. I think gun rights was the big winner nationally with the election of Donald Trump (if  he remains true to his campaign rhetoric), and gun rights also picked up wins on the state level as well. For while the anti-gun crowd picked up some wins in left-leaning states thanks to a huge cash infusion from Michael Bloomberg’s anti-freedom Everytown for Gun Safety organization – expanded background checks in Nevada, temporary gun confiscation in Washington and draconian regulations in California — Maine’s voters defeated an expanded background referendum and an anti-2nd Amendment senator in Florida was beaten in his reelection bid.

The bid to require background checks on private firearm sales in Maine fell 52 percent to 48 percent. Opponents noted the law would have done nothing to reduce crime but would have created a financial and regulatory burden on law-abiding citizens beyond involved in individual sales. The law also required background checks on guns loaned to non-family members both ways: when the gun is loaned out and when it is returned.

The big win in Florida involved the defeat of Republican state Senator Diaz de la Portilla of Miami Dade. Portilla, who was chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, had twice blocked an open carry bill by refusing to let it out of committee after it passed the Florida House overwhelmingly. He had also blocked other pro-gun bills assigned to his committee by refusing to allow their discussion.

Portilla was replaced by an anti-gun Democrat, but another anti-gun Democrat was defeated by pro-gun Republican Rep. Frank Artiles, who voted for the open carry bill last year, making it a net win for gun rights.

In Oregon, Brad Avakian, the state bureaucrat who persecuted  a bakery out of existence over the owners’ refusal to violate their Christian beliefs and bake a wedding cake for a lesbian “wedding,” lost his bid for secretary of state by 4 points. Avakian ran touting his social liberal bona fides and didn’t shrink from his persecution of Sweet Cakes by Melissa, in which his Bureau of Labor and Industries socked a $135,000 fine on the bakery and used the state’s deep pockets to continually fight Aaron and Melissa Klein in court. Financially ruined, Sweet Cakes closed its doors for good in October.

Avakian’s defeat is especially telling given that his opponent, Dennis Richardson, became the first Republican to win a statewide seat in deep blue Oregon in 14 years.