Last week I was driving through the most rural parts of northwest Kansas, listening to ABC News Radio because it was the only radio station available. The segment was about the response to the atrocious terrorist attack in San Bernardino. One clip was from a man who stated that he was sick and tired of President Barack Obama reflexively calling for “all guns to be banned” every time there is a shooting tragedy in the country. The supposedly objective host sitting in Washington, D.C., then decided to go off script and add his own two cents by stating, “President Obama has never said he wants to ban all guns.”There is absolutely no evidence that Barack Obama has ever been confronted by any gun-control policy that he has viewed as objectionable.
My immediate response, while barreling down the dirt road of America’s true heartland, was to wonder how in the hell the host knew that. I’d bet everything in my life that means anything to me that he has said that precise thing multiple times. He probably chanted it while smoking pot with his fellow hippies at Columbia and Harvard, and while “working” so hard during his professional career as a community organizer in the city with the strictest gun control in the country.
There is absolutely no evidence that Barack Obama has ever been confronted by any gun-control policy that he has viewed as objectionable. None. Zero. Nada. In light of this, what would make any reasonable person assume that he would object to a comprehensive ban on all firearms in America? He recently touted Australia’s dramatic 1996 firearm confiscation as a model. He clearly lamented the fact that his own country hasn’t taken similar “modest” steps to end all violence and ill will among mankind.
We all know about his active support of proposals to ban the most popular long guns and magazines in the country. We know he supported the absolute ban of civilian handgun acquisition in places like Chicago and Washington, D.C., despite the fact that handguns are the most commonly used firearms for self-defense. We know that he supported the reckless lawsuits against gun manufacturers that had the sole intention of bankrupting the entire firearms industry, thereby rendering the Second Amendment a hollow promise for future generations.
Then, he held some positions on firearm-related policy that aren’t quite as well known. Some of these include:
- Supporting a ban of almost all common rifle ammunition. This is precisely what Ted Kennedy’s “cop killer bullet” amendment would have done, despite his silly, baseless claims to the contrary;
- Supporting gun owner licensing and gun registration schemes;
- Advocating for a repeal of concealed-carry laws despite the fact that the tens of millions of license holders through the years have proven themselves trustworthy, safe and responsible;
- Refusing to add his name to a friend-of-the-court brief signed by 55 other U.S. senators endorsing an individual right interpretation of the Second Amendment in the Heller case;
- Supporting a plan to prohibit gun stores from being located within five miles of any school or park, something that would eliminate almost every gun shop in the country;
- Supporting a ban on affordable handguns most often favored by those citizens who are forced to live in high-crime neighborhoods where they most need means of protection;
- Supporting lengthy waiting periods on gun purchases and one-gun-a-month rationing schemes.
On a flight in 2010 or so, a man sitting next to me called me everything but a liar for NRA’s statements during the 2008 presidential campaign claiming that Obama was the most anti-gun general election candidate in history. He said that Obama had done nothing to erode gun rights while in the Oval Office. I told the Kool-Aid-drinking guy that everything would change once the president was free from being held accountable by the voters in his second term. Of course, Obama’s well-established record made NRA right then, and his actions since re-election most definitely make me right now.
President Obama is now an unapologetic policy slob who can’t wait to get to the microphone every time there is word of a shooting event in the country in order to blame a lack of sufficient controls on gun ownership. It is disgusting to watch. Without knowing any of the circumstances associated with the individual events, he cries for the enactment of this gun-control measure and that gun-control measure. Of course, none of the ones he pounds the podium about could even arguably have been of consequence in the case at hand once the dust settles and the facts are known. He couldn’t care less, and this is what earns him the title of “policy slob.”
He has said that his failure to erode the firearms freedoms of his fellow Americans has been the single greatest disappointment of his two terms in office. This is pretty big stuff when you consider things like the unadulterated chaos his lack of leadership and strategy has caused around the world. He’s obviously serious about this particular failure!
As I continued thinking and driving down that beautiful dirt road surrounded by America, I realized how thankful I was for the pro-freedom majorities in Congress that NRA-ILA and my fellow NRA members have secured for us all. Without them at this very moment in America’s 239-year history, we would have hell to pay. President Obama is now an unapologetic policy slob who can’t wait to get to the microphone every time there is word of a shooting event in the country in order to blame a lack of sufficient controls on gun ownership.
We would see what could only be described as a surfeit of gun-control activity rolling unabated through the House and Senate. Nothing would be too extreme to consider, especially after the Supreme Court’s recent refusal to hear the appeal of the case from the Seventh Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals that upheld a ban on semi-automatic firearms and standard-capacity magazines. Obama’s fellow extremists in the White House would be all too happy to plan the signing ceremonies.
In Sept. 2008, CBS News quoted Obama as saying to voters on the campaign trail, “This can’t be a reason not to vote for me, because your guns … we’re not going to mess with them … spread the word with your friends.” Lying is standard operating procedure for Obama. Nothing about this quote should shock us. He has always been the Machiavellian who will say and do anything to get what he wants. In this case, it was the most powerful office in the world.
Having been given the opportunity, he has done everything in his power to “mess” with our gun rights. The only thing that has stopped him is Congress. He hates it, and all freedom-loving Americans should enjoy it. This all goes to show that elections really do have consequences. In the case of 2014, they were good ones. Without each and every one of us taking our obligation to vote seriously, including in those elections further down the ticket, we would see the most essential individual freedom in the most freedom-oriented country in world history utterly eviscerated.
Maybe the not-so-objective ABC News Radio host was right and Obama has never said he wants to ban all guns, at least publicly. What would it matter if he had explicitly said that he doesn’t want to ban all guns? As my friends used to say in school, the guy lies like a rug. His words are meaningless. His actions are what matter, and those prove that he has never seen a gun-control policy he considers too extreme.
There is nothing to suggest to anyone that a complete ban of civilian gun ownership would be a step too far. Left to his own devices, there is no doubt in my mind that he’d take that step with a big smile on his face. Fortunately, Congress is there to kick his feet out from under him. We must ensure that a pro-freedom Congress remains in place in case the next president is as much of a nightmare as Obama has been.
