Watch Live: Congressional Hearing on IRS Scandal

Live Now on TheBlaze Radio: ‘The Buck Sexton Show’

Crime

Ronald Reagan Supported an Assault Weapons Ban, Says Obama — The Potentially Surprising Details

Jan. 16, 2013 2:48pm Mytheos Holt

President Barack Obama is fond of selling his policies by citing the support of former Republican/conservative luminaries. And arguably, no star shines brighter in the conservative firmament than former President Ronald Reagan. So it should surprise no one that President Obama, when casting about for a person to invoke in his current-day battle against gun control, would seek any evidence possible that Reagan might have supported that position, or a similar position. As it happens, Obama got his evidence:

Second: Congress should restore a ban on military-style assault weapons, and a 10-round limit for magazines. (Applause.) The type of assault rifle used in Aurora, for example, when paired with high-capacity magazines, has one purpose — to pump out as many bullets as possible, as quickly as possible; to do as much damage, using bullets often designed to inflict maximum damage.

And that’s what allowed the gunman in Aurora to shoot 70 people — 70 people — killing 12 in a matter of minutes. Weapons designed for the theater of war have no place in a movie theater. A majority of Americans agree with us on this.

And, by the way, so did Ronald Reagan, one of the staunchest defenders of the Second Amendment, who wrote to Congress in 1994, urging them — this is Ronald Reagan speaking — urging them to “listen to the American public and to the law enforcement community and support a ban on the further manufacture of [military-style assault] weapons.”

Obama did not explain his reference to Reagan, which might justifiably have left many observers either skeptical or scratching their heads in confusion. After all, the idea of Reagan lobbying for one of the more infamously despised pieces of left-leaning gun legislation is counterintuitive, to say the least. More to the point, this is hardly the first time Obama has cited Reagan before as a dubious source of inspiration. As Benny Johnson reported on TheBlaze in April of last year:

“I’m not the first president to call for this idea that everyone has to do their fair share,” the president noted. Quoting one Reagan speech, Obama insisted the 40th President would consider our tax loopholes today “crazy.”

“He thought that in America the wealthiest should pay their fair share and he said so,” Obama assured.

He then went on to call the Reagan “That wild eyed, socialist, tax-hiking, class warrior” in a sarcastic reference to some of the titles that Obama himself has accumulated.

“That position might disqualify him from the Republican primaries these days, but what Ronald Reagan was calling for then is the same thing we’re calling for — a return to basic fairness and responsibility.”

The President ended his comparison, “If it will help convince folks in Congress to make the right choice, we could call it the Reagan rule instead of the Buffett rule.”

Yet unlike Obama’s assertion about taxes, which is at odds in spirit with Reagan’s own tax reforms, evidence for the idea that Reagan genuinely supported a ban on assault weapons exists, and we are here to examine and, in some cases, explain it.

The Evidence

The piece of evidence that has been cited most extensively (often on liberal blogs) is a letter written in 1994 and cosigned by Reagan, former President Jimmy Carter and former President Gerald Ford supporting then-President Clinton’s assault weapons ban. Here is the text of that letter, via Daily Kos:

May 3, 1994
To Members of the U.S. House of Representatives:

We are writing to urge your support for a ban on the domestic manufacture of military-style assault weapons. This is a matter of vital importance to the public safety. Although assualt weapons account for less than 1% of the guns in circulation, they account for nearly 10% of the guns traced to crime.

Every major law enforcement organization in America and dozens of leading labor, medical, religious, civil rights and civic groups support such a ban. Most importantly, poll after poll shows that the American public overwhelmingly support a ban on assault weapons. A 1993 CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll found that 77% of Americans support a ban on the manufacture, sale, and possession of semi-automatic assault guns, such as the AK-47.

The 1989 import ban resulted in an impressive 40% drop in imported assault weapons traced to crime between 1989 and 1991, but the killing continues. Last year, a killer armed with two TEC9s killed eight people at a San Francisco law firm and wounded several others. During the past five years, more than 40 law enforcement officers have been killed or wounded in the line of duty by an assault weapon.

While we recognize that assault weapon legislation will not stop all assault weapon crime, statistics prove that we can dry up the supply of these guns, making them less accessible to criminals. We urge you to listen to the American public and to the law enforcement community and support a ban on the further manufacture of these weapons.

Sincerely,

Gerald R. Ford

Jimmy Carter

Ronald Reagan

However, a form letter from a former president on a current issue of the day need not necessarily have that president’s personal fingerprints on it, and especially given that Reagan was diagnosed with Alzheimers later the same year this letter was sent, we needed more evidence to suggest that Reagan himself personally supported the idea. As such, we went back to news coverage from 1994 to see how the issue was being treated, then.

According to a story in the Los Angeles Times, it checks out: Reagan did support the ban.

Moreover, as Buzzfeed has documented in a longer piece exploring the passage of the Assault Weapons Ban, Reagan’s influence over the debate about that bill amounted to more than just one form letter. He actively sought out support from Republicans and defied the NRA, and may have been the person who was ultimately responsible for the passage of the bill by getting two former opponents to back it:

As the assault weapon ban vote neared, Reagan — who as president had signed 1986 legislation loosening restrictions on guns — wrote a letter with former Presidents Ford and Carter to the House of Representatives urging them to vote in favor of the ban.[...]

Congressman Scott Klug, a Republican from Wisconsin was an opponent of the assault weapon ban and the day before the vote stated his opposition to the ban. Klug only changed his voted after “a last minute plea from President Reagan” in the form of a handwritten note.

”Dear Scott: As a longtime gun owner and supporter of the right to bear arms, I, too, have carefully thought about this issue. I am convinced that the limitations imposed in this bill are absolutely necessary,” Reagan wrote Klug. “I know there is heavy pressure on you to go the other way, but I strongly urge you to join me in supporting this bill. It must be passed. Sincerely, Ronald Reagan.”

”I can think of no one who has been a stronger supporter of law and order and a stronger supporter of the Second Amendment,” Klug said in a statement regarding Reagan’s note announcing his support for the ban.

Another former Congressman, New Hampshire Democrat Dick Swett, also credited the former President with influencing his vote.

So not only did Reagan support the assault weapons ban, but he actively campaigned for it and made sure to get his fingerprints all over it. Obama’s reference to the previous President is undeniably correct.

However, this fact raises an important question – that is, why would a president whose legacy from his time in office is one of unabashed conservatism suddenly jump to support such a liberal cause?

Why Reagan Might Have Supported the Assault Weapons Ban

Obviously, it’s difficult to speculate on such a question without being able to get inside Reagan’s head. However, there is plenty of evidence from Reagan’s own life, as well as his tenure in office both as president and as Governor of California, to suggest two contributing factors to his embrace of gun control, which we will tackle in turn:

1. The assassination attempt on Reagan

As many people who lived through the Reagan years, or who have studied them in detail, will recall, Reagan was the victim of an assassination attempt early in his first term as President by the deranged would-be killer John Hinckley. And despite the former President’s seemingly nonchalant response to this event as it occurred (he quipped, “I hope you’re a Republican” to the attending surgeon), it apparently left a deep traumatic scar on him. In fact, the assassination attempt is what Reagan himself fingered as motivating his thinking about this issue in an op ed supporting gun control in 1991:

I was lucky. The bullet that hit me bounced off a rib and lodged in my lung, an inch from my heart. It was a very close call. Twice they could not find my pulse. But the bullet’s missing my heart, the skill of the doctors and nurses at George Washington University Hospital and the steadfast support of my wife, Nancy, saved my life.

Jim Brady, my press secretary, who was standing next to me, wasn’t as lucky. A bullet entered the left side of his forehead, near his eye, and passed through the right side of his brain before it exited. The skills of the George Washington University medical team, plus his amazing determination and the grit and spirit of his wife, Sarah, pulled Jim through. His recovery has been remarkable, but he still lives with physical pain every day and must spend much of his time in a wheelchair.[...]

This nightmare might never have happened if legislation that is before Congress now — the Brady bill — had been law back in 1981.

Named for Jim Brady, this legislation would establish a national seven-day waiting period before a handgun purchaser could take delivery. It would allow local law enforcement officials to do background checks for criminal records or known histories of mental disturbances. Those with such records would be prohibited from buying the handguns.

Some of Reagan’s rhetoric here might sound understandable, even to NRA members. Gun advocates are not uniformly opposed to all background checks and many support better resources to screen out mentally ill buyers. In this sense, Reagan would fit well within the mainstream of his own party, even if his support of the 1991 Brady Bill was novel at the time he wrote the above op ed.

However, there’s a lot of daylight between the Brady Bill and its seven day waiting period and screening processes, and an all-out assault weapons ban. So why would President Reagan support both the latter and the former? Here things get murky, but another contributing factor may be found in his tenure as Governor of California.

2. Opposition to the Black Panthers

As it happens, if President Obama’s researchers had wanted to find a real whopper for him to cite in his speech, they could have gone beyond even Reagan himself and pointed out that the NRA itself has supported gun control as recently as the late 60′s. In fact, in one of the NRA’s most high profile (and controversial) victories from the late 60′s, then-Governor Ronald Reagan was a key partner. That victory was the passage of the Mulford Act.

What was the Mulford Act? Nothing less than an outright ban on carrying guns in public places, a law that would today sound draconian in general, let alone a piece of legislation with support from the NRA. Yet at the time, the law had support from the NRA and was signed by Reagan without any hand wringing whatsoever. What gave?

Quite simply, the law was being passed to target a group that many of today’s conservatives would find just as noxious as they did then – specifically, the Black Panthers. At the time, the Panthers had deep roots in Oakland, California, and were engaged in “safety patrols,” described this way by PBS:

The Police Patrols had become an integral part of BPP community policy. Members of the BPP would listen to police calls on a short wave radio, rush to the scene of the arrest with law books in hand and inform the person being arrested of their constitutional rights. BPP members also happened to carry loaded weapons, which were publicly displayed, but were careful to stand no closer than ten feet from the arrest so as not to interfere with the arrest.

This arguable vigilante justice quite understandably unnerved more than a few people, especially when the Black Panthers began rallying and openly protesting police behavior in the aftermath of the shooting of African-American man Denzel Dowell. The Mulford Act, dubbed “The Panther Bill” by the California press, was meant to ensure that such rallies would remain free of gun violence, and also to disarm the Panthers themselves, thus keeping what many people saw as a group of heavily armed, paramilitary street thugs from effecting civil war with the police. And indeed, its passage saw a massive protest from the Panthers at the California State Capitol. PBS again:

Passage of the Mulford Bill would essentially end the Panther Police Patrols, so the BPP sent a group to Sacramento, California on May 2nd, 1967 to protest. The group carried loaded rifles and shotguns, publicly displayed and entered the State Capitol building to read aloud Executive Mandate Number 1, which was in opposition to the Mulford Bill. They tried to enter the Assembly Chamber but were forced out of this public place where they then read Executive Mandate Number 1 out on the lawn.

Needless to say, this act remains controversial today, with some liberals calling the NRA racist (to say nothing of Reagan) for wanting to stop blacks from protecting themselves from police brutality. However, for our purposes, it shows that especially in the case of the 1994 assault weapons ban — which shows some similarities to the Mulford Act — Reagan might have seen similarities to a previous NRA-backed piece of legislation that had imposed a much more draconian anti-gun regimen in the name of preserving public order.

And consider this: Reagan still got the endorsement of the NRA when he ran for President in 1980, which raises an important point: Not only did Reagan support one of the more forceful anti-gun laws of the 60′s, but he never had to explain his support for that law, or pay any kind of evident political price for it. As such, when combined with the attempt on his life by a lunatic, one can easily see how Reagan could combine his already uneasy feelings about gun after the assassination attempt with his previous political experience passing gun bans as Governor of California to produce a position in favor of banning all assault weapons.

This position no doubt made sense to him, but as some conservatives observed after the 2008 elections, there are places where conservatives might want to get beyond Reagan, and indeed have, in the case of this position. Nevertheless, if President Obama wants to fly the flag of a man that one of his most ruthless constituencies despises as a racist and oppressor, further alienating that very constituency, there is nothing in the historical record to stop him.

In CONTROL, Glenn Beck presents a passionate, fact-based case for guns that reveals why gun control isn’t really about controlling guns at all; it’s about controlling us. Find out more HERE.

Back to The Blaze »

Comments (172)

BOUNCESoff
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 5:45pm
It’s a known fact that people who have done evil, live a life of fear, thus they mistakenly put their faith of protection in guns instead of God. And we all know that Thugs, Racists, do evil to people. I have a simple hand gun that has been locked up for three years. The only time it was ever removed from the safe in my basement, was when my basement was being re-finished and I did not want to leave the safe in the basement with the handgun. I serve a God who has told me to fear no man. I am well aware of the dangers in the world, and I use my God given sense to avoid any dangerous situation as best I can. I pray every single day before I leave my home and I feel extremely safe. Does that mean that I am not aware of my surroundings, does it mean that I do not watch my back when I go to the ATM, and things of that nature, no it does not. But it certainly does not mean that I am going to walk around with an assault rifle, looking for someone to give me a dirty look, so that I can shoot him dead. Or go over to a car parked and blast holes into the car, because the music is too loud. Much like they do in Mississippi and Florida, knowing darn well, that if they were not packing, they would ignore that dirty look and the loud music and keep on going about their business. Get the devil out of your lives and bring God. Ask God to let love shine on thee, let it be seen, that you can be free. Ask God to change you right here and rid you of fear, your prayers he will hear.

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
conservative karl
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 5:33pm
Unlike Reagan, we have the advantage of looking at the Assult Weapons Ban in hindsight. We know it didn’t do any good and that the law was based mostly on cosmetic features of a gun and not actual function. So to me it doesn’t matter he supported it because we now have facts and reality on our side and not just speculation. Give the man a break, he tried, it didn’t work, let’s move on.

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
BOUNCESoff
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 5:32pm
@drs1969

And I can’t wait for God to announce where he wants all of you racists to go.

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
GuruMeditation
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 5:29pm
So what? It doesn’t mean it was the right thing to do.

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
HI_Don
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 5:29pm
Rhetoric, diversion and smoke and mirrors.

Assault weapons Ban – no one defines what an Assault weapon is or isn’t.
Guns made for the battlefield – The AR-15 is NOT a military weapon nor is it made or suitable for the battlefield. Any soldier carrying one of these as their preferred weapon is going to be DEAD – 30 round magazine or not.
Reagan’s legislation was against Fully automatic weapons such as the AK-47, a Russian military weapon. You can argue if that was the right thing or not or if it infringes on the 2nd amendment, but at least he was talking about actual automatic military weapons. Obama and his ilk want you to believe semi-automatic are the same thing and the number of bullets it holds should be limited – ie they want your protection limited. Reagan wanted a waiting period for purchase – he didn’t seem to confuse that with lots of red tape and requirements enacted as barriers to lawful purchase. Guess which way Obama is going?
Don’t forget, the purpose of the police is to show up and draw the chalk line around the person with less fire power. They don’t prevent crime, they investigate it. All Obama has to do next with his exec orders in place, is get doctors to agree that the desire to own a gun is a mental health issue sufficient to prevent gun ownership, or the lack of routine mental screening can be cause to confiscate guns you already own.

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
tankyjo
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 5:28pm
Can anyone tell me what an assault weapon is? As opposed to say, a love weapon? A weapon of healing? A weapon of peace? I thought as much. It’s all in the language. Hate crimes, racism, all false premises.

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
doncorleone
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 5:01pm
Weren’t brady and Reagan shot w/a .38? Also, how many m16′s were in the guns stores during his presidency or when he was governor of california? If he had a change of heart in the early ’90′s, it’s immaterial. The ’90′s version of the assault weapons ban did nothing to deter crime. Does anyone recall (had to throw the hitlery line in, she’s going to “testify” soon), about that bank heist in l.a. in the late ’90′s, where the gunmen were fully encased in body armor, w/full auto ak47′s w/100 shell drum mags. rippin’ l.a.’s finest a new one. They took on a gaggle of police, and it took them quite awhile to take them down. All of the state-runs especially in cali were a’wailin’ for law enforcement to arm up to take on the “bad guys”. Let’s jump forward towards today. Our extra-constitutional president was blathering on about bring to justice people who provide these weapon to the “bad guys”, is he going to arrest dear deputized (from castro for the elian gonzalez kidnapping) a.g. holder, then turn himself in? How about the benghazi weapons deal that was going on and those 4 americans were murdered? Who in the regime and in the state dept. going to pay for that?

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
topperj
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:49pm
The old saying is still true, “Two wrongs don’t make a right.” Even good men do stupid things. Reagan is no exception. He was human, not a god like our current president.

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
CathyvanDyke
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:41pm
It is apparent that Ronald Reagan’s liberal position regarding the banning of assault rifles became official following the offset of Alzhiemers? Are gun control advocates exploiting Reagan to further an agenda.

‘Does He Remember Being President?’
Ronald Reagan was never particularly admired for his memory. But in the late 1980s and early ’90s, he slowly began to lose his grasp on ordinary function. In 1992, three years after leaving the White House, Reagan’s forgetting became impossible to ignore. He was eighty-one. In a regular White House checkup late in his second term, the President began by joking to his doctor, “I have three things that I want to tell you today. The first is that I seem to be having a little problem with my memory. I cannot remember the other two.”
http://www.beliefnet.com/Health/2004/06/Does-He-Remember-Being-President.aspx

Report this comment
Log in to ReplyReply
- CathyvanDyke
  Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:44pm
  Ronald Reagan – 40th President of the USA (1981-1989)
  “You won’t get gun control by disarming law-abiding citizens. There’s only one way to get real gun control: Disarm the thugs and the criminals, lock them up, and if you don’t actually throw away the key, at least lose it for a long time… It’s a nasty truth, but those who seek to inflict harm are not fazed by gun controllers. I happen to know this from personal experience.”
  
  Report this comment
- CathyvanDyke
  Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:59pm
  It makes sense that Ronald Reagan realized when he made the following 1975 speech prior to the onset of Alzheimers that the banning of assault rifles would leave each American at the mercy of a tyrannical government whose army could overpower.
  
  Ronald Reagan – 40th President of the USA (1981-1989)
  “There are those in America today who have come to depend absolutely on government for their security. And when government fails they seek to rectify that failure in the form of granting government more power. So, as government has failed to control crime and violence with the means given it by the Constitution, they seek to give it more power at the expense of the Constitution. But in doing so, in their willingness to give up their arms in the name of safety, they are really giving up their protection from what has always been the chief source of despotism government. Lord Acton said power corrupts. Surely then, if this is true, the more power we give the government the more corrupt it will become. And if we give it the power to confiscate our arms we also give up the ultimate means to combat that corrupt power. In doing so we can only assure that we will eventually be totally subject to it. When dictators come to power, the first thing they do is take away the people’s weapons. It makes it so much easier for the secret police to operate, it makes it so much easier to force the will of the ruler upon the rule.”
  
  Report this comment
338_LM
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:38pm
Reagan was a grand capitalist who understood supply and demand. Thanks to the National Firearms Act of 1986, a mostly-stamped REAL “assault weapon” (full auto) that was worth hundreds of dollars is NOW worth tens of thousands of dollars. A small collection of steel Fleming “auto-sears” have done better than Krugerands in the Class 3 world. (Please comment if you know what I’m talking about.)

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
balrog25
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:30pm
Uncle Ron was the most constitutional president in my lifetime, the only one that made any recoveries of personal freedom. Brother Barry has been the most lying treacherous marxist/statist president in my lifetime. I served President Reagan, and you Mr. Obama are not only no Reagan, you are a lying POS, unamerican, marxist, racist, etc. etc. etc. May God forgive you in Heaven, but I cannot rise to God’s wish for me to forgive you on earth. Maybe BHO is an anti-christ, there are so many, and he certainly tries to lead us from Jesus. I’ll try to pray harder.

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
electedface
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:19pm
40% of guns sold do not perform background checks. These are acquired illegally through online gun sales, gun shows, etc.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_hZQPpCJ1M

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
BOUNCESoff
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:01pm
Hello Racists,

So let me get this straight. all these years no one, not one of you ever mentioned anything about Reagan having Alzheimer’s while he was President, but NOW, that it is learned that he TOO wanted a ban on assault rifles, you all want to PUSH THIS CRAP about him being ill, when he signed his name. LMAO. You stupid racists have no problem reaching for any little morsel of a nugget to keep your Lord and savior the almighty glock alive and well do you. So you attack attack attack the president of the USA, yet you all had no problem with having a Republican president who was not lucid serve out country.

AMAZING.

Report this comment
Log in to ReplyReply
- drs1969
  Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:08pm
  Our current Prez thinks we have 57 states. Show Nuff!
  
  Report this comment
Southernsoul
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:01pm
SOSORRY, even someone like you should be able to understand the 2nd Amendment, it is pretty short and simple. The part you might want to focus on is the, “shall not be infringed”. It doesn’t matter what anyone in the past, or anyone in the future, or anyone today says, there are to be NO laws governing what weapons we are allowed to have. I would say that gun owners have compromised enough by accepting the laws we had yesterday. At that point, NO MORE. If you really want to save lives, why not get your little feelings all worked up about the 1000 babies that were murdered today at the hands of abortionists?

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
electedface
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 3:55pm
40% of guns sold do not perform background checks. These are acquired illegally through online gun sales, gun shows, etc.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
1SFG
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 3:52pm
Sosorryforyou go back under your bridge!

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
SPOT_OF_TEA
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 3:51pm
I have to laugh at these leftists who bash conservatives until they think they can use a conservative’s belief to bolster their case on a certain topic…….Lets say for example that Reagan was for gun control…..well everything we hear from the left,Reagan was wrong about everything so wouldn’t that make it so gun control is a bad thing????We have been told Reagan was a baffoon but now miraculously he is a genius all of a sudden……but dont worry,Reagan will soon be described as a fool again after he is no longer useful to the vermin.

Report this comment
Log in to ReplyReply
- CathyvanDyke
  Posted on January 16, 2013 at 7:35pm
  SPOT_OF_TEA
  
  The left will use any prominent Conservatives to further their agenda if he/she were to backtrack of his/her prior Conservative positions on the issues.
  
  Report this comment
THX-1138
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 3:45pm
I have a (Polish, I think) AK-47 on order from my boys in blue (and, no, I don’t mean cops). 10K rounds, Next week. The price is way up now but, wth…

Go ahead. Ban what the hell ever you want. All you’re going to do is make Mikey a rich mofo. (He sends Obama a big High Five.)

Report this comment
Log in to ReplyReply
- drs1969
  Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:13pm
  I think Feinstein and others are also profiting from this.
  
  Report this comment
Chet Hempstead
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 3:43pm
Why is anybody surprised? Ronnie Reagan invented gun control when he was Governor of California. Back then gun control was pushed by conservatives and supported by the NRA in order to disarm left wing groups like the Black Panthers.

Report this comment
Log in to ReplyReply
- drs1969
  Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:16pm
  30 years ago, the bumper stickers said ‘When you outlaw guns, only outlaw will have guns’. Those laws were illegal and stupid.
  
  Report this comment
alinskythis
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 3:35pm
“Wild eyed, socialist, tax-hiking, class warrior….”

Wow, is he DELUDING himself!

He obviously doesn’t read the blogs, or the actual things that are being said about him.

(Hint: This is an exploitable weakness to be filed away….)

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
media-bias-steals-elections
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 3:32pm
Missing from the article is the recent testimony by the NRA CEO that these restrictions had no effect on crime? How many of you know in your hearts, if you were honored with the ear of President Reagan today, and asked him this simple question, Mr. President, what is the real difference between the “rapid fire” violent action of buck shot coming out of a shot gun shell, and a semi-automatic rifle?

I think he would have thought about it for a minute, perhaps thought about how many times a gun is used in close proximity that would negate the advantage of either weapon and come to the conclusion they are virtually equal in their ability to assault criminals in defense of law abiding citizens? If you punish someone for having basically the same thing (injustice), you are violating the principals of other laws, and that would have bothered President Reagan?

So here it is the bottom line, “gun control” infringes on the right to bear arms, and technically does not make a difference in the physical realm, other than to jeopardize the freedom and reputation of otherwise law abiding citizens under the impression they have civil rights?

If there is no difference between a shot gun shell and a 10 round magazine, the difference in the mind of a mal-nutritioned meth head is what? That gun control laws work in the criminal’s favor, by the disturbed impression he has he is not going to get caught anyway, you encourage the thoughts?

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
eric55
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 3:26pm
Maybe Obama should embrace all of Reagan’s policy’s and then we can talk about guns how about that mr. imposter and chief

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
republic2011
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 3:25pm
Again, who cares if Reagan supported this or not. If it is unconstitutional, then shame on Reagan and shame on Obama.. nuff said. Getting tired of politicians using feeble references to drum up support for something that is not constitutional.

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply
Zeus is THE Lord
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 3:19pm
The truth hurts, doesn’t it loonies? But then again, the truth and Blaze-reading sheep are like oil and water…

Report this comment
Log in to ReplyReply
- drs1969
  Posted on January 16, 2013 at 4:20pm
  Lincoln and his AG wanted blacks to go back to Africa. I can’t wait for BHO to announce he wants this, as well.
  
  Report this comment
Susan
Posted on January 16, 2013 at 3:18pm
I get the idea Glenn wants us to accept another loss of freedoms. Too bad Glenn, I wish I owned an assult weapon, AND A TANK!

Report this comment
Log in to Reply Reply

It appears that you have Javascript Disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser preferences for a better user experience on TheBlaze. You can not comment without Javascript enabled.