So, our president whose administration lost control of 1,300 AK-47 assault rifles in their Fast and Furious program wants to lead the nation in controlling access to assault weapons. Seems to me he and his administration don't have a clue how to do that so why should we think they can? Oh, I get it! They'll create a huge(!) bureaucracy to do it right this time. Bureaucracies know how to get the job done, right? Right!
And what motivates him to do something about deadly guns getting into the hands of bad guys? 20 children dying in Newtown. Of course that's a tragedy that begs we do something but don't you wonder why the death, mostly by guns, of 20+ school children in Chicago this year ... EVERY(!) year ... hasn't gotten his attention? How can one explain that? If 20 children dying by guns in Newtown is the reason he wants to increase gun controls, why hasn't he gotten on this bandwagon before now? 3,000 children are killed every year in the US and 17,000 are injured. EVERY year! So why hasn't that been reason enough to do more before now?
The more I experience of this president's words and actions the less I understand him. I don't understand his real motivations to do anything any more because his claimed reasons make no sense. And the selectivity of his outrage is mystifying and irrational.
This man who has proven ineptness running a gun-control operation and who doesn't seem the least bit fazed by the other thousands of child deaths by guns annually(!) now wants to do something based on 20 deaths and we're supposed to believe he knows how after his track record?
I DO wish him success fixing this problem but I seriously doubt it will be effective in reducing gun violence because I believe that, as on nearly every other endeavor, he'll not understand the root cause and therefore not arrive at a good, effective solution.
If he decides to pursue reducing the number of assault weapons sold/bought he can probably accomplish that. Problem is, 'bad guys' will simply switch to other weapons they CAN get their hands on and violent gun crime won't be much affected. I read of soooo many liberal folks claiming we need to ban assault weapons, believing that will significantly reduce violent gun crime, especially against our kids. That's completely irrational reasoning for the reason I just explained. Politicians seem to like fixes that feel good and play well in The Media and within their political party but without really caring how ineffective they are, much less whether they have any effect on the real root causes. Since what they want to do obviously won't fix the problem much less make any noticeable dent in it, one can only logically conclude that looking good or simply making themselves feel good has higher priority than doing something that will actually do something about the problem they only pretend to address.
We MUST take time to thoroughly understand the root causes of the violence in our country and fix those! I believe we'll find that declining family values, declining morals, broken homes, divorce, fatherless children. and related/unrelated mental health issues are at the root in the biggest way. If those problems don't bubble to the top of President Obama's list of things needing to be fixed, I believe it's unlikely we'll get significant positive results. The problem is WAY more complex than just the availability of assault weapons on which The Media is fixated so real(!) fixes won't be simple and the results won't come quickly.
