Jan

29

The Brady Center Gives Obama a Failing Grade

Posted on January 29, 2010 at 3:25 pm by Madrigal Maniac Under National | Print This Post | Email This Post |  


This from the president of The Brady Center.

We know that President Obama supports sensible measures to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and children.

Unfortunately, in his first year in office, the President showed no signs of leadership on the issue.

We understand that the President had a lot of important issues on his plate. However, he has a responsibility to speak about the serious problems facing our nation. And gun violence is a major problem. More than 110,000 people are killed and injured each year by guns.

Time after time, however, President Obama evaded this issue. In fact, he signed into law more repeals of good gun policies than President George W. Bush. That is why we gave him a failing grade for the first quarter of his term. Click here to read the report.

Please e-mail the President to urge him to join with us to solve the problem of gun violence.

The year started with statements being removed from the White House website that repeated support for gun violence prevention laws Candidate Obama had expressed during his campaign.

Then, after horrific, high-profile shootings last spring, President Obama and his staff studiously avoided any mention of guns.

When his cabinet members, Hillary Clinton and Eric Holder, expressed support for reasonable gun laws, they were quickly muzzled and backtracked from those statements.

In May, President Obama, without any indication of concern, signed legislation letting people carry concealed weapons in national parks. This fall, he signed legislation that allowed guns in checked luggage on Amtrak trains.

President Obama can still improve his grade by taking action to make our families and communities safer, but he needs to hear from you.

Please e-mail the President to urge him to join with us to solve the problem of gun violence.

Sincerely,

Paul Helmke, President, Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence

Here is a summation of Obama’s Brady Center report card.

Brady Background Checks: F
Gun Show Loophole: F
Gun Trafficking: F
Guns in Public: F
Federal Assault Weapons Ban: F
Standing Up to the Gun Lobby: F
Leadership: F

Similar Posts (Sometimes):

  • Share/Bookmark

Comments

3 Responses to “The Brady Center Gives Obama a Failing Grade”

  1. Daniel Jack Williamson on January 29th, 2010 3:35 pm

    It’s amazing to me that the Brady Center would try to poke the President in the eye over this, when, clearly, he’s their ally.

    Such nagging and bullying.

    If that’s how they treat their allies, then I can see why their agenda gets pushed to the back burner.

    Not that I’m alarmed by it. I unabashedly support the 2nd Amendment, and I don’t think the Brady Center does.

  2. Madrigal Maniac on January 29th, 2010 4:04 pm

    I tend to agree. That’s why I posted the email with none of my usual snarky comments.

    While I support the second amendment as well, I suspect we have differing definitions. I focus on the “well regulated militia” part.

    I believe it is o.k. to disagree with your allies. I have repeatedly taken Strickland to task over his lack of support for addiction and mental health services.

    Sill, The Brady Center reaction seems rather harsh.

  3. Daniel Jack Williamson on January 29th, 2010 5:45 pm

    I disagree with my allies on some occasions, too, which is why I’m called a RINO by some, but to those of my allies who are paying attention, they might realize I’m not really a RINO. Usually, when I’m disagreeing, I’m just calling a spade a spade.

    But, yes, I think the Brady Center is being counterproductive to their own purposes with this tactic.

    The right to keep and bear arms, I believe, is an individual right.

    Interestingly, during this recession, the nation’s violent crime rate has fallen, an observation that some pundits might view as counterintuitive, as some correlate increases in crime with increases in poverty. Among the pockets of the nation where violent crime has risen the most dramatically, the crime increase has been attributed to the gang activity of Mexican drug smugglers. If I were living in Tucson or Phoenix or El Paso or Las Vegas, and had a target on my back, for whatever reason, (suppose, for instance, that I was an informant, or had been actively working against gang interests), it would not bother my conscience one bit to have a firearm at my disposal. No matter how much we tighten gun restrictions, those drug smuggling gangs will still have an arsenal of firearms at their disposal, because it’s an integral part of the way they “conduct their business,” so to speak. They don’t care what our nation’s laws say about traversing our borders with contraband, they don’t care about the lives they endanger through their illicit drug trade, they don’t care about laws against kidnapping, torture, and murder, and they sure don’t care about whatever gun restrictions our nation might legislate. I believe the Constitution’s framers were prudent in protecting the right of citizens to arm themselves against such lawless elements.

    A militia is also important, as you’ve mentioned. One can look to the Swiss, committed to neutrality and peace, to see that preparing the citizenry, in matters of national defense, is an important component of keeping warfare away from its territory.

Leave a Reply | Basic HTML Allowed | Live Preview Below