Gottlieb spoke too soonGun rights zealot Alan Gottlieb might want to think again before shooting from the hip. Last week, the chair of the Bellevue-based Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms lit into Washington CeaseFire president Ralph Fascitelli for jumping on the murder of Officer Timothy Brenton in order to push a planned state bill banning assault weapons. After Fascitelli told Seattle Weekly that he planned to cite the case when lobbying for the bill, Gottlieb sent out a press release saying that the CeaseFire president was “dancing in Officer Brenton’s blood” by using “a cowardly crime to advance a political agenda.” It was all the more “despicable,” Gottlieb said, because no one knew whether in fact the gun used to slay Officer Brenton was in fact an assault weapon.Well, now the Seattle Times is reporting that Brenton’s assailant used an assault weapon after all. A Sunday story on the arrest of suspect Christopher Monfort noted that police found a “military-style assault rifle” during a search of his apartment, “similar to the type of weapon police believe was used to kill Brenton and wound his rookie partner.” Police spokesperson Sean Whitcomb says police have not officially said as much, and that the Times is presumably relying on its sources for that information. He declines to confirm or deny it.If true, Fascitelli’s plan to cite the case is a no-brainer. The random assassination of a police officer is a clear-cut horror that will incense conservative pols in Eastern Washington as well as wishy-washy liberals here. Will it make Gottlieb tone down his rhetoric? A call to his office has not yet been returned.