But apparently, he’s not mad enough to actually try to solve the problem. Instead, he seems happy to just use his anger to push a worthless, politicized agenda that will have absolutely no effect on the problem he claims to be angry about. Does that make him a liar or just stupid? Who knows? In any event, Obama's back on guns. Once again, he has turned his lazy, brainless efforts to gun control because he somehow believes that imposing more laws on those who would obey them will somehow prevent crazy people and lawless thugs from misusing guns.
Unfortunately for Obama, (1) life doesn’t work that way, (2) his opponents aren’t going to sit still and let him do something to eliminate their rights in the name of not fixing a problem for which his people are to blame (i.e. news media, Hollywood, the thugs the left coddles and excuses).
Obama was also dishonest in his salesmanship. For example, Obama lumped suicides, domestic violence, gang shootings and accidents together to claim that every year more than 30,000 Americans die from gun shot wounds. That’s hardly an accurate assessment however, as suicide accounts for around 22,000 of those... or 74%. Those people did not hurt anyone else in their actions, and for people who advocate euthanasia, it’s rather hypocritical to count them. About a thousand more are shot by police. That leaves 7,000 people as victims of domestic violence, gang shootings and accidents. Seeing as how there are 2.6 million deaths a year, that means guns account for about 0.2% of unwanted deaths.
He also claimed that mass shootings have taken place as people “tried to exercise other rights, such as attending worship services or watching a movie” (which I didn’t know what a right), and he argued that “the right to bear firearms is not more important than the right to worship freely or peaceably assemble.” This is an intentionally misleading statement. First, these killers are not exercising their “right to bear firearms,” they are completely in violation of the law and they are not making any sort of political statement about guns. This is the equivalent of saying that lynchings are people exercising “their right to free assembly.”
Secondly, all the rights are co-equal. And what he’s suggesting is actually that certain rights have the right to eliminate other rights. This is like saying that it’s acceptable to eliminate the right to religious freedom to ensure that people of certain beliefs can exercise the right without having to hear opposing views. Are we to ban atheists’ first amendment rights to make sure that fundamentalist Christians can meet in peace?
Anyways, having started with two misleading dollops of horse poop, here is what Obama plans. His plan supposedly includes ten provisions, but I only found seven:
(1) Online gun sellers and gun show sellers must be licensed and will need to conduct background checks.Interestingly, Obama admits that they have no idea how many people are actually buying guns without background checks, so number one is a shot in the dark. Moreover, not a single weapon used in any mass killing has come from such a sale, so it’s a bit like banning the sale of camels in the event someone decides to start using them as getaway vehicles.
(2) Manufacturers who lose guns in transit must now report those to federal authorities.
(3) Obama plans to send $500 million to treat mental illness.
(4) Obama will hire 230 more people at the FBI to process background checks.
(5) ATFe will establish a new investigation center to track illegal gun trafficking online. This apparently including hiring 200 new ATF agents.
(6) Obama will send $4 million to enhance the National Integrated Ballistics Information Network.
(7) Obama plans to get unnamed people to explore promoting magical new technologies that don't exist yet to prevent guns from going off accidentally. Maybe something like a cell phone app.
Number two is not something that I’m aware of ever happening before. Why would a manufacturer ignore the loss when they can report it to get their insurer to cover the cost and can get the cops to find the guns for them? Number 3 is so unfocused as to be meaningless. “I will cure ill health to prevent NFL concussions!” Hiring more people is a standard response by government types. If it ain’t workin’, get more people to do the same thing! Yeah, that works. Number six sounds like something the police have probably been demanding for some time. And number seven is wishful thinking... “wouldn’t it be great if we had a perfect world? We should make that happen!”
All told, I am not impressed and I can’t imagine anyone left, right, or center will be. Are you?
18 comments:
re suicide thing, the claim that banning guns would reduce suicides, at least long-term, is nonsense. For proof, look to Japan were gun ownership is very heavily restricted.
It is now common place for a Japanese subway car to stop and the PA announce "human accident", meaning someone has jumped onto the tracks.
Andrew, this man has no shame or self-awareness. It is looking more and more like he has been playing the part of a US President like some sort of amateur hour stage production with lackeys feeding him his lines.
For the life of me I can't see anything that he has improved. I'm sure if I did some research and gave it a lot of thought, I could probably come up with some social thing he's done that might have had a miniscule positive effect. Yet as far as geo-political or domestic policy it seems everything he's presided over has been a disaster. And if he wasn't a liberal minority he'd have been either laughed off the world stage or impeached for gross incompetence. I doubt any world leader respects him or his sidekicks. Half of this country can't stand him due to his mendacity and unlawful actions.
November can't come soon enough.
#1: Online sellers must be licensed and will need to conduct background checks.
It already works that way. You haven't been able to make a direct gun sale through the mail since the Gun Control Act of 1968.I buy guns online and here's how it works - you buy a gun. You pay the seller and provide the seller with a federal firearm license holder to ship the gun to. The ffl holder performs a background check on you before she releases the gun to you.
I go to gun shows too. 99% of the sellers there are dealers and they have to perform a background check before they can sell you a gun.The only sales that don't require a background check are direct private owner to private owner sales and you don't need to go to a gun show for that. The so called gun show loophole has always just been fear mongering.
GypsyTyger
GypsyTyger, I get the sense that this is an article of faith on their side, like the minimum wage or racism... "there are people who have found loopholes and are selling billions of guns directly to criminals!!!!" In fact, it seems to me that they "close" this loophole every election cycle and then they turn around and pretend that it's still there during the next cycle. It sounds like just another boogeyman meant to inspire their idiots rather than any sort of real thing to legislate.
Kit, Those are called "unintended consequences" or, as liberals call them, "something no one could have possibly known!!!" If you take guns out of the equation, then suicides become much more dangerous as people will start stepping in front of trains or jumping off of buildings. Others will die by accident. But don't try explaining that to liberals until after it happens.
Frankly, we should be celebrating the 7,000 number, which is down from 12,000 in the 1990s and even higher in the past. Instead, Obama's trying to make us sound like Brazil or Mexico or Russia or any of those other "better" countries that ban gun ownership.
Patriot, I agree completely. Obama has been a totally useless fool. He's achieved almost nothing and the little he has achieved has all turned sour.
Actually, there is one thing I think he has done which has been good: he'd moved the public far to the right. That's probably the one accomplishment he's had, and I doubt his friends think that's much of an achievement. LOL!
For me, the evidence that this is all theater is that, prior to any announced gun control measures, there is a pre-announcement that the announcement is coming. Like clockwork, it always prompts a run on gun sales and ammunition ahead of the actual announcement. This happens every. single. time. and there is no way that gun control proponents can't know this.
Of course, the leftists twist this phenomenon into "see how paranoid these people are" even though it's absolutely not paranoid to hurry up and do something that someone just told you is going to be harder or impossible to do later.
But my real point is, knowing full well that every pre-announcement of gun control results in a spike in gun sales, one could interpret that as Democrats actively trying to get more guns into private hands. I'm not saying that's actually the case, and the conspiracy rabbit hole only starts branching from there, but far from being merely ineffective, the Democrats' MO when it comes to legislating against guns works directly against the stated goal.
tryanmax, I think you've put your finger on something. I don't think the Democrats want more guns in private hands, but I think what you say shows their indifference to it.
I think what you've tapped into is that Obama and the left are doing this not to "solve a problem" but as political theater. They want this to be BIG BIG BIG! They want their supporters to see this as an event. Build excitement. Hold rallies and meetings and whip each other into a frenzy about how this time it will be different!
Then the script is always the same. They propose closing the nonexistent gun show loophole and banning a couple of "assault rifles" and they demonize the NRA, all the while knowing full well that nothing they do will ever take effect or, even if it does, it won't change a thing.
But they don't care if it changes anything or not or if it makes more people buy guys. All they care about is that they excite their followers. This is how they keep that part of their coalition thinking that they Democrats may one day give them what they want... "if only the evil NRA didn't have the power to stop them."
In fact, by going this route, they give the NRA time scream bloody murder, swear their opposition and shakedown their own followers. This in turn "proves" that the country is being "held hostage" by the NRA.
It's theater.
Tryanmax; Right you are! I go to the Bill Goodman gun shows in Dayton. At the December shows in 2008 and 2012 they were lined up around the building. In addition I have a friend at work. This guy's in his fifties and has gone his whole life without joining the NRA. After Obama's post San Bernadino speech he joined. That's one guy that I know about. I wonder how many others there are.
A month or so ago there was an article over at the federalist about how Smith and Wesson and Ruger stock has gone considerably up since 2008.
GypsyTyger
Make no mistake about it, the eventual goal is to disarm the American citizen...I read his books, I've heard his speeches, the same with Hillary..they want those guns..and if they have to do it incrementally they will....they really need to review what happened at Lexington Green, Concord Bridge and Waco...
Hey, you've got admit that the single tear running down his left cheek was a nice touch...great method acting. He must have just learned that NK successfully tested a hydrogen bomb potentially.
BTW - has anyone ever run the numbers on how many shots are fired in movies, on TV, in video streaming, and through video games on any given day (or by hour or minute)? I mean, if he's going to use Hollywood for his acting lessons and the entertainment media to propagandize, then why do they get a pass on their use of weaponry with abandon?
GypsyT - Yeah, Smith & Wesson has the only stock that has gone up in the last few days. LINK
What is sad is some of the proposals are reasonable and probably widely approved such as more money to treat mental illness and more agents to help with background checks. This could have been done without fanfare and probably could have been done through congress. But, Mr. Narcissist can't do that. The republicans in congress just get in his way although he never really tries.
The political theater, especially the crying, pisses me off because I don't believe it. This is probably the biggest difference between liberals and conservatives. Liberals and sad and cry over Sandyhook but stand around looking worried and impotent. Conservatives are pissed and wish they had been there to pop a cap in the back of his head.
Kcat.....One of the biggest differences I've noticed between "Liberals" and "Conservatives" is that the left is all about Inputs. What can they put into the equation. The right is more concerned with Outputs. What will be the result of the equation.
So, one side is all about the "process." Who is inputting what into the problem. The other side is about the outcome. If we put all of your wonderful, great sounding, empathetic ideas into the problem, will it ADDRESS THE PROBLEM!
We have yet to see how all the heartfelt actions,money, conferences and such have made much of a difference.
I guess it all comes down to tyranny. Leftists: You people just aren't acting the way you should! We will have to silence you one way or another in order for us to achieve our Utopia here on Earth."
The hell with them I say.
I'm not big on guns (I just recognize that trying to ban something popular and widely available is utterly pointless) but I heard five seconds of Obama talking on the radio about the right to go to the movies and switched the channel. So painfully nonsensical...
I wonder of Obama is going to cry tonight?
During your commenting on guns and Obama, I see that you broke your 4th rule of no name calling when you said "he has turned his lazy, brainless efforts". I stand as an Independent and have no problem with your view; I love reading them, but I just wanted to point this out.
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