The Gun Issue is not Going Away

Like so many Americans, my heart aches for the family of a two-year-old  that was accidentally shot killed by her five-year-old  brother. I was surprised what, Kentucky State Police Trooper Billy Gregory said “In this part of the country, it's not uncommon for a 5-year-old to have a gun or for a parent to pass one down to their kid," he said.  I was  equally surprised that a gun manufacturing company  makes a gun and a commercial that caters to juveniles.  There's a couple of manufacturers who cater to children but this one puts out rifle they call “Cricket.” They make a pink version for the young girls.

I know that children who are raised in rural areas learn how to drive a tractor at a very young age, and they are also taught how to shoot and respect a weapon at that age. I don't know the complete story of the Kentucky shooting and I'm not one to start placing blame on the parents because lord knows they have to live with this situation for the rest of their lives.  My blame is saved for gun manufacturers who make money by enticing young children. How are they different from the cigarette manufacturers who make commercials targeting teenagers?

Last night I saw a very civil discussion between a liberal host, Chris Hayes and a gun enthusiast, Dan Baun who just wrote a book titled “ Gun Guys.”Dan Baun started by saying that he was angered by Chris Hayes’s intro where he described a gun culture out of control.Mr. Baun said that he was taught to shoot at age five, but his dad kept the rifle in a locked cabinet where children and thieves would have trouble gaining access to the weapons.  Mr. Braun is not a member of the NRA because he said they've been radicalized since 1977.  Come to think of it, 30 years ago we didn’t equate the second amendment with the NRA.  In those days the NRA magazine was called the “American Rifleman” and its prime objective was to teach gun safety.  I remember back in the sixties where the country kids had a rifle in their pickups mounted behind the seats and  no one paid attention.  The liberal and the gun enthusiast agreed that everyone should go through a background check to purchase a weapon and that we need to improve a system that allowed 237 people on the terror watch list to purchase a gun.  

This issue continues to be about the $22 million the gun manufacturers will lose if any gun legislation prohibits the purchase of a weapon in any form or fashion.  Poll numbers do not frighten legislators because as Senator Flake of Arizona said, “ those are just polls that are promoted by left wing websites.” Those were the same polls that stated that Senator Flake was going to win a close election.  I am completely surprised that Republican Senator Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire told her constituents that she was afraid that background checks would lead to a  Federal registrar. Senator Ayotte used to be a prosecutor, and we all know how they go through the law with a fine-tooth comb. I'm 100% positive that she knows that the bill included a 15 year prison term for anyone who kept  a record of the background check.  She's hoping that her constituents were too dumb to notice and but her approval has dropped 15% since she cast that no vote.  Oh when you practice deceive. 

The NRA and will hold its annual convention tonight in Houston Texas and  they have chosen all the right wing crazies to speak to their crowd. Glenn Beck is the keynote speaker but in between the convention will feature the likes of Sarah Palin, Rick Santorum,Ted Nugent,Ted Cruz, and governors Bobby Jindal and Rick Perry. They will also hear from their newly elected president, an Alabama lawyer named Jim Porter. He'll fit right in because Porter said that the Civil War was about northern aggression, Obama was a fake president, and that Mr. Holder and then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton were“trying to kill the Second Amendment at the United Nations.” The vendors selling tinfoil hats and kool aid will make a killing.  You've got to know that the media will attend the convention just so they can report on the ridiculous comments coming from that crowd.  The NRA convention is CPAC on steroids. The speakers can’t wait to get to the gun show where they will get their picture taken displaying them holding an AR15. Nothing shows intelligence more than sporting a couple of bandoliers, a Bowie knife clinched between your teeth while holding an AR15 at the ready.

As I understand, another version of a background check bill will be submitted but this time it'll be much simpler.  It won’t be submitted until after the immigration bill, and it will just include commercial sales like gun shows and the Internet sales.  There's nothing like dumbing and watering down a piece of legislation to get Congress’s approval.  We'll look back on this chapter of history and call it the era of wooziness.

Living in the Past

I'm an old guy; I love my nostalgia, but I don't let it influence me that much.  I believe there's a time and a place for everything, and that's why Joe Scarborough drives me up the wall when he continues to compare presidents Ronald Reagan and Lyndon Johnson to our current president. He always leaves out the part where Reagan won 49 states and Johnson consistently had control of both houses. Scarborough considers himself an expert in presidential politics because he served in Congress.  That will give him a one up on me on the day –to- day operation but revisionist history cannot wipe out the reality of having to have 60 votes in the Senate in order to pass a major piece of legislation. President Obama  has to have the votes of five Republican senators on any given day. 

Joe Scarborough thinks President Obama is a weak president with no leadership skills, and some mainstream columnists are starting to write columns echoing the same thoughts. At his press conference yesterday, the president looked down beaten because nothing is getting done. Many in the press are blaming the president because the background check legislation failed although it had a 90% approval.  I guess in a country where we believe that the “the buck stops here” that's to be expected. Unlike other presidents before him, Obama doesn't have earmarks to persuade a wavering lawmaker.  Committee chairs are powerless with the sixty vote mandate.  Polarization and primaries are the main reasons for the stalemate. Those situations may sound like excuses , but no one can deny that those conditions exist in today’s politics.

Republican representative Tom Cotton from Arkansas is a Harvard Rhodes Scholar  and a veteran of two wars in the Middle East but has chosen to vote and take positions outside the mainstream in order to stay to the right of future  competition.  Senator Ted Cruz is a graduate of Harvard and Princeton, yet placates himself to the less-educated  Tea Party.  Those two politicians can see the reality of partisan redistricting, so they'll do and say whatever  it takes to hold on to their seat. Peddle revisionist history, no problem, obstruction, easy  consider it done and CNN, Meet the Press,  and Fox loves to have controversial guests spout their views because it boosts ratings.

History is important and it should help us from repeating mistakes. I’ll bet my last dollar that the mistakes of invading Iraq is influencing the president’s decision on what to do about Syria. The president was talked into tripling the size of troops in Afghanistan because the surge in Iraq slowed down the violence. This is where history failed us with the surge of troops in Afghanistan because the countries and situations were not the same.

For some reason, the press doesn’t want to believe that the GOP hates the president even though Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) revealed that some members of his party opposed expanding background checks for gun sales recently because they didn't want to "be seen helping the president." The press forgets, and the Democrats don’t remind them of the meeting by GOP leaders had on the day of the president’s first inauguration where they decided to vote against anything that the president wanted.  I remember the bad right- wing press Governor Chris Christie got when he praised President Obama’s Hurricane Sandy response.  History will write that chapter, but it's not going to be before President Obama leaves office. 

Joe Scarborough likes to say that President George. W. Bush was equally hated by the left, but he scrambles the whole eight years together. After 9/11 the country united and Bush enjoyed high approval ratings until he made the mistake of invading Iraq. Joe continues to say that Bush found a way to push through legislation as if to praise his leadership capabilities. That’s not so on many fronts because Democrats voted for the war resolution because they were afraid of being painted as being weak and Bush passed the two tax cuts through Budget Reconciliation where only 51 votes were needed. President Bush tried to pass Social Security privatization , but his own party didn’t back him up nor did they allow Harriet Miers to be a Supreme Court nominee.

History can be your ally or your foe so it’s important to get your fruits (apples and oranges) to match.