Wednesday, January 16, 2013

WATCH, READ: Obama's Reaction To Initial NRA Proposal That NRA Now Finds "Hypocritical"

The NRA is portraying President Obama as an "elitist hypocrite" because daughters Sasha and Malia go to a school that has armed guards and he is "skeptical" about putting guards in all schools.  The National Rifle Association is pushing an ad (below), and a spokesman defended it to NBC this morning.

But, did the President really oppose the NRA's big idea in reaction to last month's elementary school murder spree?  He spoke with Meet the Press' David Gregory last month, and he explicitly did NOT oppose the NRA's measure or even express skepticism about the idea itself.  The question begins at 16:10:
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Here is the transcript of his full answer to Gregory about the NRA's idea:
"GREGORY: Do we have an armed guard...PRESIDENT OBAMA: But...
GREGORY: ...at every school in the country? That's what the NRA believes. They told me last week that could work.
PRESIDENT OBAMA: You know, I am not going to prejudge the recommendations that are given to me. I am skeptical that the only answer is putting more guns in schools. And I think the vast majority of the American people are skeptical that that somehow is going to solve our problem. And, look, here's-- here's the bottom line. We're not going to get this done unless the American people decide it's important.
And so this is not going to be simply a matter of me spending political capital. One of the things that you learn, having now been in this office for four years, is the old adage of Abraham Lincoln's. That with public opinion there's nothing you can't do and without public opinion there's very little you can get done in this town. So I'm going to be putting forward a package and I'm going to be putting my full weight behind it. And I'm going to be making an argument to the American people about why this is important and why we have to do everything we can to make sure that something like what happened at Sandy Hook Elementary does not happen again."  (emphasis added)
Was Obama being hypocritical in any way?  Or, is it the NRA that is being hypocritical today, twisting the President's comment when they were not pleased with the initial reaction to their "school shield" proposal.




But ultimately the way this is going to happen is because the American people say, “That's right. We are willing to make different choices for the country and we support those in Congress who are willing to take those actions.” And will there be resistance? Absolutely there will be resistance.
And the question then becomes, you know, whether we are actually shook up enough by what happened here that it does not just become another one of these routine episodes where it gets a lot of attention for a couple of weeks and then it drifts away. It certainly won't feel like that to me. This is something that, you know, that was the worst day of my presidency. And it's not something that I want to see repeated.


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