President Barack Obama issues executive orders on the gun control. He will present his proposals to Congress. It's going to be a contentious fight with Republicans and the National Rifle Association.
From the Huffington Post, The New York Times and Associated Press, the president enacted gun control proposals by executive order.
The proposal, which comes at the end of a month-long review process spearheaded by Vice President Joe Biden, is broken down into four key subsections: law enforcement, the availability of dangerous firearms and ammunition, school safety and mental health.
In an effort to touch on all four of those elements, the president recommended requiring criminal background checks for all gun sales; reinstating the assault weapons ban; restoring a 10-round limit on ammunition magazines; eliminating armor-piercing bullets; providing mental health services in schools; allocating funds to hire more police officers; and instituting a federal gun trafficking statute, among other policies. The cost of the package, senior officials estimated, would be roughly $500 million, some of which could come from already budgeted funds.
Because these recommendations require congressional approval, the administration is supplementing its proposal with 23 executive actions that will be taken immediately. Those actions include requiring federal agencies to hand over relevant data for a background check system; providing law enforcement officials, first responders and school officials with better training for active shooting situations; directing the Centers for Disease Control to research the causes and prevention of gun violence; and many more.
"I intend to use whatever weight this office holds to make them a reality," said the president, speaking about his full set of recommendations. "If there's even one life that can be saved, then we've got an obligation to try."
The approach is so sweeping that what would have otherwise been a headline-grabbing announcement received second billing. The president on Wednesday will nominate Byron Todd Jones, the acting director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, to take over the post permanently.
In total, the proposal goes beyond what most gun control advocates were hoping for at the start of Biden's review process, during which he held 22 different meetings with 229 different organizations and 31 elected officials.
"This is a monumental moment. It's a long time coming and we're thrilled the president's putting the full weight of his office behind this," said Josh Horowitz, executive director of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. "We're ready to push this thing through."
But putting together ideas is the easy part. Selling them on the Hill will take a bit of legislative craft.
The president goes into the forum with determination that he can get this done!
"I will put everything I've got into this and so will Joe [Biden]. But I tell you, the only way we can change is if the American people demand it," said Obama. "We are going to need voices in those areas and congressional districts where the tradition of gun ownership is strong."
"It can't just be the usual suspects," he continued. "This will not happen unless the American people demand it."
The gun-rights lobby has already signaled that it will try to block the administration's effort. A spokesman for the National Rifle Association did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the president's proposal. But the organization has already harshly criticized the Obama administration for overreach.
Ronald Reagan once wrote in the New York Times that he supported the Brady Gun Law. The 40th President Of The United States survived a near assassination. He was shot by John Hinckley, a man with mental issues and obsession with actress/director Jodie Foster.
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| President Ronald Reagan survived a point blank shooting by John Hinkley in 1981. The president was in Washington when the WHITE terrorist shot him. Reagan's press secretary at the time Jim Brady was severely injured and was left paralyzed. |
Shot in March 1981, Ronald Reagan revisits it in the 1991 piece. He stated that 10 years ago a deranged young man standing among reporters and photographers shot a policeman, a Secret Service agent, my press secretary and me on a Washington sidewalk.
I was lucky. The bullet that hit me bounced off a rib and lodged in my lung, an inch from my heart. It was a very close call. Twice they could not find my pulse. But the bullet's missing my heart, the skill of the doctors and nurses at George Washington University Hospital and the steadfast support of my wife, Nancy, saved my life.
Jim Brady, my press secretary, who was standing next to me, wasn't as lucky. A bullet entered the left side of his forehead, near his eye, and passed through the right side of his brain before it exited. The skills of the George Washington University medical team, plus his amazing determination and the grit and spirit of his wife, Sarah, pulled Jim through. His recovery has been remarkable, but he still lives with physical pain every day and must spend much of his time in a wheelchair.
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| Victims of gun violence. The families of victims lost to the Sandy Hook tragedy in 2012. |
Thomas Delahanty, a Washington police officer, took a bullet in his neck. It ricocheted off his spinal cord. Nerve damage to his left arm forced his retirement in November 1981.
Tim McCarthy, a Secret Service agent, was shot in the chest and suffered a lacerated liver. He recovered and returned to duty.
Still, four lives were changed forever, and all by a Saturday-night special -- a cheaply made .22 caliber pistol -- purchased in a Dallas pawnshop by a young man with a history of mental disturbance.
This nightmare might never have happened if legislation that is before Congress now -- the Brady bill -- had been law back in 1981.
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| Heat. |
Named for Jim Brady, this legislation would establish a national seven-day waiting period before a handgun purchaser could take delivery. It would allow local law enforcement officials to do background checks for criminal records or known histories of mental disturbances. Those with such records would be prohibited from buying the handguns.
The current gaps among states, those that have waiting periods report some success. California, which has a 15-day waiting period that I supported and signed into law while Governor, stopped nearly 1,800 prohibited handgun sales in 1989. New Jersey has had a permit-to-purchase system for more than two decades. During that time, according to the state police, more than 10,000 convicted felons have been caught trying to buy handguns.
Every year, an average of 9,200 Americans are murdered by handguns, according to Department of Justice statistics. This does not include suicides or the tens of thousands of robberies, rapes and assaults committed with handguns.
This level of violence must be stopped. Sarah and Jim Brady are working hard to do that, and I say more power to them. If the passage of the Brady bill were to result in a reduction of only 10 or 15 percent of those numbers (and it could be a good deal greater), it would be well worth making it the law of the land.
President Barack Obama heard the call of the American nation and he decided to work on getting things done! With the power of his pen, the president signed off executive orders to make law enforcement and those in the health industry to look into individuals with mental issues.
The proposal would instead affect the future production and sale of military-style weapons or high-capacity magazines.
"We are not going to go after existing stock of weapons or magazines," said a senior administration official. "We are going to limit it to the manufacturing of assault weapons and clips going forward."
The White House nevertheless insists that its package of proposals has teeth. It would provide law enforcement with the mechanisms needed to go after the illegal transfer of weapons and help prevent those weapons from falling into the wrong hands. It would also stem the use of military-style weapons -- the White House says its proposal would improve on the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban, which was riddled with loopholes -- and give schools and communities resources to address violence when it occurs.
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| President Barack Obama promised swift action to curb gun violence in the United States. He meets with survivor and gun control advocate Jim Brady. |
The question, in some respects, is not what's missing from the set of ideas, but what took the administration so long to get to this point.
"It is not as though we had this whole policy paper sitting on the shelf somewhere," said a senior administration official. "[We worked] 24/7 for the past month. And we met with a lot of groups and we learned a lot of ideas that came as a result of this process. We tried to be as comprehensive as possible. We are hoping that as the process goes on and as the debate goes on, we might come up with some other ideas."
The president also knocked the Republican and Democratic members of Congress still focused on getting "A" ratings from the NRA. The members of Congress who vote against gun control usually are embraced by the NRA.
The president also makes note of the gridlock in Congress and urged the American people to demand representatives and senators to get things done on gun control.
The president also endorsed the NRA's idea of having more school resources and guards in the nation schools. The NRA has maintained that any proposals regardless of what the president does they'll oppose.
Given the opportunity to look into the entertainment industry (i.e. video games, rap music, rock music, movies, television, blogs), the president noted that educators and those who study health in children should look out for warning signs of violence. Also as a parent, the president also noted that no parent wants to lose a child whether at Newtown's Sandy Hook, the Clackamas Town Center, a place of worship such as the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin, the Aurora movie shooting, or the streets of Chicago.
This issue is developing and we here at Journal de la Reyna will keep you informed about the latest news in the president's proposals and the debate over gun control in Congress.
