Helen Chenoweth Quotes
Let’s think what an assault weapon is. It could be a pencil –- a stab in the heart.
This quotation is a classic case of conflation. The politician who is asked about the dangers of assault weapons and who is opposed to gun control, observes that a pencil could kill someone and that a terrorist MIGHT attack with a pencil. Therefore she conflates the semiautomatic rifles like AK47s with pencils. No one would think of legislation making it difficult to obtain pencils; therefore she makes the gun control efforts appear trivial and silly. The problem is that many Americans are killed every year by weapons designed for assaulting in battle and killing an enemy. No one can find the a case where anyone ever assaulted and killed another person by stabbing him in the heart with a pencil.
Helen Chenoweth, U. S. Congresswoman (Republican, ID) Statement to High School Students, April 14, 1998
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Johnson federalized the Michigan National Guard and sent Army troops into Detroit after racial violence broke out in 1943, but insisted that the troops not carry ammunition
Helen Palmer Chenoweth-Hage, born Helen Margaret Palmer was a Republican politician from the U.S. state of Idaho. She remains the only Republican woman to ever represent Idaho in the United States Congress.
