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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forums"Obama: Gun-control advocates have to listen more" AP story
Here is a new AP story with some interesting quotes from the President:
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/obama-gun-control-advocates-should-listen-more
Snip
"WASHINGTON (AP) President Barack Obama says gun-control advocates have to do a little more listening than they do sometimes in the debate over firearms in America.
In an interview with The New Republic, Obama says he has "a profound respect" for the tradition of hunting that dates back for generations.
"And I think those who dismiss that out of hand make a big mistake. Part of being able to move this forward is understanding the reality of guns in urban areas are very different from the realities of guns in rural areas," he says.
End snip
When asked ifhe had ever shot a weapon, the President answered:
"Yes," the president says, "in fact, up at Camp David, we do skeet shooting all the time."
dballance
(5,756 posts)In the majority, greater than the majority, I have not heard gun safety advocates call for much, if any, restriction on what are typically considered hunting weapons. They've been honoring the proud tradition of hunting that dates back for centuries. They've also acknowledged that rural areas have different needs than urban areas. There are real needs for guns on farms to protect the livestock from wild animals and no one has suggested we restrict farmers from having the guns to do that. When I grew up on the farm we did just fine with shotguns and a .22 rifle.
Times change though. I don't use a brick cellphone now because technology has advanced and I can have an iPhone that fits in my pocket. Perhaps an AR-15 is a great and appropriate weapon for protecting livestock now and it's just new technology with which I'm not familiar. However, the AR-15 has attributes that the guns I used growing up did not. I could not have loaded a high-capacity magazine into any of those weapons and fired shots just as fast as I could pull the trigger. That does make the AR-15 a little different.
Obama's aides and policy advisors really screwed up on giving him talking points that included "the reality of guns in urban areas are very different from the realities of guns in rural areas." Yes they are. Rural areas probably tend to use rifles more than hand guns. At least that was my experience. There were no hand guns in those gun racks in our trucks.
The "realities of guns in urban areas" are that they are overwhelmingly hand guns. He just opened the door to widening the discussion beyond the semi-auto rifles to the semi-auto hand guns when I'm certain that was not his intention. I would wager of the 435 gun deaths in Chicago in 2012 that 99.9% of them were with hand guns and not rifles.
How about this Obama? We'll do a little more listening if you'll do a little more action. Will that work for you? Because, frankly, I'm just about listened out about how we should accommodate gun owners and manufacturers at the expense of the safety of our children, our neighbors and ourselves.
kelly1mm
(4,734 posts)of the story. Maybe "Both sides need to listen more" would have been more appropriate given the President' status? We really could not ask him to say "Gun control opponents need to be ignored" (although some would like that) given the realities of being President of the United States vs. some congress member from a pro-gun control district, or even Senator from a pro-gun control state.
davidn3600
(6,342 posts)We live in a violent culture. That has to change or it doesnt matter what we ban.
Gun control laws are like trying to beat the flu with an aspirin. It might take some of the symptoms away, but the virus causing the problem is still there.
Unfortunately the type of change required to make this a less violent society can't be done by passing laws. It has to be done intrinsically within the minds of the population.
cthulu2016
(10,960 posts)The more extreme left in anything exists primarily as a tackling dummy for moderates to use to show their reasonableness.
I do not entirely disagree with Obama here, but it is what it is. Hippie punching.
hack89
(39,171 posts)handguns are the killers in America.
As for the AR-15, it is a 60 year old design using 100 year old technology. Semi-automatic rifles were in common use when you were growing up - they just look different.
forestpath
(3,102 posts)those of us who don't sit back and keep quiet.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)Obviously I don't know what guns you grew up with, but semi-automatic rifles with detachable magazines were very common even 50 years ago. The only innovation of the AR is that its body is plastic.
He just opened the door to widening the discussion beyond the semi-auto rifles to the semi-auto hand guns when I'm certain that was not his intention.
I hope it was his intention; frankly I could care less about rifles in the larger picture. It's handguns that kill the most people, by far.
OneTenthofOnePercent
(6,268 posts)I wonder if he trolls political discussion boards on the internet too!
Crap! Did I just say that out loud?!? Uh, I mean... Go OBAMA!!
No, but seriously... the fact that he makes his own homebrew and blasts clays is one reason he totally rocks.
I'd love to swap some homebrews with him after shooting some clays!
Best bachelor party I ever went to involved 3 cases of clays followed by 3 cases of beer (AFTER we put the shotguns away) and then a 10 pound marinated piece of prime rib on a spit over a campfire. No girls, no bars, no craziness... just a bunch of us friends shootin the shit!
dballance
(5,756 posts)Gee, brewing his own beer and shooting skeet. Those are both pretty "he-man" things to do. Don't know why the "he-men" in the GOP can't get in touch with it.
I never really had any fun at the bachelor parties where we rented a limo and women and went to bars and got blasted. I think the party you went to would have been a lot more fun.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)... the White House ordered the first bottle of hooch out of the still.
OneTenthofOnePercent
(6,268 posts)well, I plead the fifth on that too.
Three words: "Apple Pie Moonshine"
+ + =
Cali_Democrat
(30,439 posts)We're listening to the sounds of children screaming as they're gunned down at school. We're listening to the tens of thousands of Americans that die from firearms every year.
We're listening.
kelly1mm
(4,734 posts)in the rural areas instead. In order to "bridge the gap" you know?
octoberlib
(14,971 posts)These Democrats from largely rural states with strong gun cultures view Obamas proposals warily and have not committed to supporting them.
The lawmakers concerns could stand in the way of strong legislation before a single Republican gets a chance to vote no.
All eyes are on a core group of these Democrats, including Sens. Max Baucus of Montana, Mark Begich of Alaska and Mark Pryor of Arkansas, who are up for re-election in 2014.
The Senate Judiciary Committee begins hearings Wednesday.
JaneyVee
(19,877 posts)Heimer
(63 posts)I'm not understanding what those slides are trying to show?
Lizzie Poppet
(10,164 posts)Some more-rural states are among the worst, but by no means all. Maryland, California, Illinios, and Michigan are in the top ten, for example.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_violence_in_the_United_States_by_state
JaneyVee
(19,877 posts)Lizzie Poppet
(10,164 posts)California was 4th on the list (Maryland second). Moreover, there are rural states near the bottom in terms of gun-related homicide per capita, too (North Dakota, Wyoming...and one can argue that Vermont and New Hampshire are more rural than urban, too). There are rural and urban states scattered all over the chart...to the point that this is clearly not a valid factor in predicting firearms homicide rates.