“One of the most frustrating things that I hear is when people say – who are opposed to any further laws – ‘Why don’t you just enforce the laws that are on the books?'” Obama said. “They can do the same amount of damage with a pipe bomb”. “Since this is a main reason they exist, you’d think that they’d be prepared to have a debate with the president”.
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Perhaps this is why, when asked by a reporter, presidential spokesman Josh Earnest could not come up with a single recent mass shooting that would have been prevented by the president’s gun control proposals.
The widow of the most famous sniper in US military history confirmed that President Barack Obama’s “Guns In America” CNN special featuring an invite-only crowd had those in attendance submit their questions in writing beforehand confirming for many the suspicion that the fake “townhall” was a carefully scripted media event. “But like you, we believe that guns should be kept away from criminals, terrorists, domestic abusers, the dangerously mentally ill, and children”.
Taya Kyle’s gun control critique did not end there.
Read the full op-ed here. She believes the focus for preventing mass shootings should not be on the weapons, but instead on the killers and the flawed health care system that does not prevent them from taking action. Chris Kyle was killed when he was shot at a shooting range by a former US Marine. “Simply having a weapon did not make him a murderer”. And they accuse gun lobbies of intentionally watering down legislation and hamstringing agencies so the laws are useless, a point lobbyists contacted by CNN declined to address. In fact, we did the same thing around auto fatalities with sensible seatbelt laws that save lives.
We have slipped into a land of government that has promised the moon, seldom delivered and driven us into a world of more laws, more government, and less freedom – and none of that has stopped murder, pain and suffering. He also noted that his critics are exaggerating it.
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Obama’s plan creates a more sweeping definition of gun dealers as a way to increase the number of sales requiring background checks. Just after his 2012 re-election, Obama pushed hard for a bipartisan gun control bill that collapsed in the Senate, ending any realistic prospects for a legislative solution in the near term.
