Vice President Biden’s gun violence task force has reportedly
identified 19 separate actions on guns that the President can make with executive orders. Obama may direct federal agencies to more effectively share mental health records. Not every seriously mentally ill person posts public videos like James Yeager... or goes on paranoid rants like Alex Jones. The legislative action with the greatest chance of passing would be to improve the system of background checks. We need universal background checks. Right now anyone who can’t pass a background check can just get their gun at a gun show. It would be like having a separate entrance to the airplane for people who didn’t want to go through a security screening.
The task force may also recommend
making gun trafficking a federal crime. As it stands now, gun trafficking is a joke. Under current law, to get a conviction for gun trafficking, prosecutors have to prove the seller knew the buyer was a felon, or had clear reason to know. How could they prove that the seller knew the buyer was a felon—if the buyer had a
chin mullet?
Congressman Steve Stockman of Texas is
threatening to impeach President Obama if he uses executive orders to regulate guns. Have you noticed that the conservative solution to any problem these days seems to either be impeachment, secession, or going on a killing spree? Impeachment, really? Does he think that using executive orders to regulate guns rises to the level of “high crimes and misdemeanors” like, say, consensual sex.
President Obama is warning Republicans not to allow the federal government to default on its obligations. Obama said “They will not collect a ransom in exchange for not crashing the American economy.” In a sense it’s a shame that Republicans can’t get anything for crashing the economy—it’s the one thing they really know how to do. Refusing to raise the debt limit doesn’t put an end to spending. All it does is to put an end to paying. We don’t save any money by not raising the debt ceiling. The time to save on your heating bill is when you set the thermostat, not when you’re writing the check to the utility company.
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