Obama's Historic Plan for Gun Control

On Monday, Joe Biden promised us 19 Executive Orders on Guns.

Today President Obama surprised us by signing 23 of them on stage after his press conference surrounded by children who had written letters to him after the Newtown/Sandy Hook Massacre. He said the actions will take place immediately, plus told Congress he expects them to work on several more pieces of legislation such as an all-out ban on assault rifles.

He stressed responsibility, but also the fact that the children and parents of Newtown, Aurora, and other communities have a Constitutional Right not to live in fear of future attacks. So the 2nd Amendment rights of NRA members do not come before the safety of children. Obama stood up for Newtown, and for all of us, against a group that would rather see him dead and he knows it.

This is ground-breaking and earth shaking, and GOP heads are exploding right now.

I am so proud of my President and Vice President! Bravo!

Transcript Here on Washington Post

Details of Gun Control Proposals from the White House

1. Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal agencies to make relevant data available to the federal background check system.

2. Address unnecessary legal barriers, particularly relating to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, that may prevent states from making information available to the background check system.

3. Improve incentives for states to share information with the background check system.

4. Direct the Attorney General to review categories of individuals prohibited from having a gun to make sure dangerous people are not slipping through the cracks.

5. Propose rulemaking to give law enforcement the ability to run a full background check on an individual before returning a seized gun.

6. Publish a letter from ATF to federally licensed gun dealers providing guidance on how to run background checks for private sellers.

7. Launch a national safe and responsible gun ownership campaign.

8. Review safety standards for gun locks and gun safes (Consumer Product Safety Commission).

9. Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal law enforcement to trace guns recovered in criminal investigations.

10. Release a DOJ report analyzing information on lost and stolen guns and make it widely available to law enforcement.

11. Nominate an ATF director.

12. Provide law enforcement, first responders, and school officials with proper training for active shooter situations.

13. Maximize enforcement efforts to prevent gun violence and prosecute gun crime.

14. Issue a Presidential Memorandum directing the Centers for Disease Control to research the causes and prevention of gun violence.

15. Direct the Attorney General to issue a report on the availability and most effective use of new gun safety technologies and challenge the private sector to develop innovative technologies.

16. Clarify that the Affordable Care Act does not prohibit doctors asking their patients about guns in their homes.

17. Release a letter to health care providers clarifying that no federal law prohibits them from reporting threats of violence to law enforcement authorities.

18. Provide incentives for schools to hire school resource officers.

19. Develop model emergency response plans for schools, houses of worship and institutions of higher education.

20. Release a letter to state health officials clarifying the scope of mental health services that Medicaid plans must cover.

21. Finalize regulations clarifying essential health benefits and parity requirements within ACA exchanges.

22. Commit to finalizing mental health parity regulations.

23. Launch a national dialogue led by Secretaries Sebelius and Duncan on mental health.

Joe Biden ~ 19 Executive Proposals About Guns

Vice President Joe Biden has given his gun committee recommendations to President Obama.

Reports say there are suggestions for at least 19 Executive Actions Obama could take as early as tomorrow.

From Politico

The executive actions could include giving the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention authority to conduct national research on guns, more aggressive enforcement of existing gun laws and pushing for wider sharing of existing gun databases among federal and state agencies, members of Congress in the meeting said.

. . . Rep. Mike Thompson (D-Calif.), the chairman of the House Democrats’ Gun Violence Prevention Task Force, said the magazine ban and universal background checks would be far more effective than an assault weapons ban without the political cost.

“Probably the most recognizable thing you can say in this debate is ban assault weapons,” Thompson said. “But the other two issues” — forbidding high-capacity ammunition magazines and requiring universal background checks for gun purchases — “those two things have more impact on making our neighborhoods safe than everything else combined. Anytime you try and prohibit what kind of gun people has it generates some concern.”

Biden has gotten input from many groups including the National Rifle Association (who is "disappointed" and sees no point in restricting anything), Hunters and Sportsment, Mental Health Officials, representatives of the Film and Video Gaming Industries, and Multi-Faith Groups.

Biden also spoke to the parents of children killed in the Newtown tragedy.

From CNN

Beau Biden, attorney general of Delaware, said on CNN's "The Situation Room." "He was on the phone with many of the survivors of the tragedy in Connecticut."
"I was in and out of the room when he was on some of these calls," he continued. "I would, you know, go to the door and go away when I knew he was on the phone with these moms and dads," Biden said. "So he's listened to everyone that has a stake in this and is doing his best to come up with a comprehensive strategy."

2012 ~ Apocalypse Postponed ...Again

One of the first posts I wrote on this blog back in March 2012 was about the National Geographic TV show "Doomsday Preppers." I had watched a couple of episodes and was amazed at the level of fear and paranoia in these hoarders of spam, rice and guns.

Prepping for the Doomsday Olympics

I wrote:

. . . these people longing for Armageddon don't laugh very much.They are deadly serious about everything and just want to show off their mad survival skills in the end-of-the-world Olympics. They've given up on life, music, and fun in favor of fear mongering.
. . . I couldn't help but feel a little disturbed that one family has enough food for the next 20 years while other people are eating out of dumpsters. But this philosophy isn't about helping the "other people" - the belief is that the weak ones are going to be destroyed by the next disaster while the self-sufficient strong survive. Doomsday Prepping begins at home and ends at home. Like their brethren in the Republican Party who don't believe in "sharing the wealth" or "that dang socialism," Doomsday Preppers live in the Narcissistic States of America.

At the time I was thinking about Paul Ryan's budget and the whole Ayn Rand philosophy as something that drives these clannish survivalists. But now that both the election and the Doomsdays - Dec. 12 or Dec. 21 - have come and gone with nothing unusual happening, these folks now seem like regular old Tea Party members to me.

Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs, they fit right in with Todd Akin and the other anti-science people, the unskewed polls people who reject the math in front of their eyes and believe what they want to believe. Their love of ammunition hoarding is second only to that of Wayne LaPierre of the NRA, and if they aren't vapor-locked in their underground bunkers right now, they are cheering on the Congressman who refuse to do anything while a great country takes a dive over a man-made fiscal cliff.

Many now say it's a "New Age" instead of the end of the world. Where will the Doomsday Preppers fit into that scenario? They don't consider "peace and quiet" a plausible future, so I imagine that they really are doomed to be marginalized just like the anarchy-based Tea Party and the Gun-Loving GOP. The New Age will sail on without them, and good riddance.

LaPierre on the Crazy Train

source: Matt Bors
OK, Mr. LaPierre - I call you Crazy!

From Meet the Press, Sunday December 23, 2012

DAVID GREGORY: This is a matter of logic, Mr. LaPierre, because anybody watching this is going to say ‘hey wait a minute. I just heard Mr. LaPierre say that the standard is we should try anything that might reduce the violence. And you’re telling me that it’s not a matter of common sense that if you don’t have an ability to shoot off 30 rounds without reloading, that just possibly you could reduce the loss of life? Would Adam Lanza have been able to shoot as many kids if he didn’t have as much ammunition?’

WAYNE LAPIERRE: I don’t buy your argument for a minute.

From NBC News

“If it’s crazy to call for putting police in and securing our schools to protect our children, then call me crazy,” LaPierre told NBC’s David Gregory. “I think the American people think it’s crazy not to do it. It’s the one thing that would keep people safe and the NRA is going try to do that.”

. . . President Barack Obama has tasked Vice President Joe Biden with the job of consulting with members of the Cabinet and outside organizations to come up with legislative proposals by next month.

When asked about this initiative, LaPierre said, “if it’s a panel that’s just going to be made up of a bunch of people that for the past 20 years has been trying to destroy the Second Amendment, I’m not interested in sitting on that panel…. The NRA is not going to let people lose the Second Amendment in this country.”

Following LaPierre on Meet the Press, Sen. Charles Schumer, D- N.Y., said that the NRA leader is “so extreme and so tone deaf that he actually helps the cause of us passing sensible gun legislation in the Congress…. He is so doctrinaire and so adamant that I believe gun owners turn against him as well.”

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Prepping for the Doomsday Olympics

Out of boredom, I watched a few episodes of the show Doomsday Preppers on the National Geographic Channel. Instead of hoarding junk or kittens, these folks stockpile food and ammunition for when the "Government Declares Martial Law." Well, at least that's what one woman in Utah said was doing as she proudly showed off her stun gun, her tower of boxes full of food and water, and her emergency backpack in case she needed to head for the hills.

 In another episode, a man was driving his wife and daughter crazy by cluttering their house with huge plastic jugs full of rice. Funnily, his wife was an expert on survival, having grown up in Cambodia during the Khmer Rouge reign of terror. Her remarks were a nice counterpoint - she said she would survive differently in an emergency, by killing a rabbit, catching fish, or stealing food if she had nothing to eat. And having escaped from an evil internment camp to come and live in the United States, I can see why she doesn't really want to hear about her husband's visions of Armageddon, or give up and live in the underground bunker (cave actually) with a big metal door into which he proudly led his reluctant family. It looked like a death trap to me, some place a control freak could lock up women basically and feed them rice till they all die. I think that poor woman should take her daughter and go find a husband who likes to tell jokes.

 That's one thing I noticed - these people longing for Armageddon don't laugh very much.They are deadly serious about everything and just want to show off their mad survival skills in the end-of-the-world Olympics. They've given up on life, music, and fun in favor of fear mongering. Yes, they may think they are the logical ants who are working hard for an inevitable future while we foolish grasshoppers fiddle and play, but even from a religious standpoint they are forgetting that the Bible says to "take no thought of what you eat or drink." Or how about the story of the Loaves and Fishes? I couldn't help but feel a little disturbed that one family has enough food for the next 20 years while other people are eating out of dumpsters. But this philosophy isn't about helping the "other people," the weak ones who are going to be destroyed by the next disaster. Doomsday Prepping begins at home and ends at home. Like their brethren in the Republican Party who don't believe in "sharing the wealth" or "that dang socialism," Doomsday Preppers live in the Narcissistic States of America.

Don't get me wrong - I want to take care of me and mine, too. I shiver at thoughts of the Yellowstone Super Volcano, Nuclear Fall-Out or a Viral Pandemic. But having lived through horrible tornadoes and hailstorms this year here in Tennessee, I know that when it is my time to go, I'm gone. God isn't going to ask permission before he blows away my house, and no stun gun can stop that either. I am much more worried about strong winds than the "Gummint."

We have a very simple emergency box: some canned goods, matches, charcoal, aluminum pans, candles, and a radio. No stun gun, sorry. My husband and I figure ordinary life is scary enough with making our kids paranoid enough to shoot any human who "threatens" the family compound. That's the ultimate in-crowd/out-crowd Group Think that leads to another Waco massacre or Jim Jones Cult mass suicide. Us versus Them - survival of the fittest. It's interesting that most of these folks probably don't even believe in evolution even while preaching social Darwinism, and they also forget that maybe God has a sense of humor. If they had any introspection at all, they might smile inwardly at the absurdity of their actions. Don't they recall the Millenium 2000 scare when civilization was supposed to grind to a halt? Never happened, and millions of people had to eat crow - whoops, sorry - had to eat stale cereal and canned tuna for years because they had used up all their money while "prepping."

I'm sure this show gets good ratings for National Geographic. But I wonder what they are highlighting here? Is it the social phenomenon of our divided society or the psychological phenomenon of people drinking too much Wingnut Kool-Aid?