CNN
The Texas lawmaker who vowed to protect his state from gun control measures enacted by President Barack Obama had a fiery clash with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer Wednesday over the issue of background checks.
Steve Toth, who said he plans to introduce the “Firearms Protection Act” banning federal gun bans, said Texas is going to ensure that “we follow the United States Constitution.
“If this government infringes on our Second Amendment right which gives us the right not only to bear arms but tells the government, the federal government, not to create any laws that infringes on those rights, we will do everything we can to push back against that,” Toth said.
Blitzer asked Toth whether he was talking about a possible effort to secede from the United States, to which Toth answered no. “I’m pretty sure that’s not what this discussion is about,” Toth said.
Instead, he brought up the New York firefighters shot to death while responding to a fire on Christmas Eve by a man previously convicted of murdering his grandmother with a hammer.
“If we want to get serious about limiting violent crime in America we’ve got to look at mental health issues and we’ve got to look at punish people who commit violent crimes and when they commit violent crimes they’ve got to go to jail and stay in jail,” Toth said. “Let’s get serious about this.”
When Toth said Republicans have for years called for instant background checks, Blitzer asked the representative if he supports universal background checks on all gun transactions.
“No I don’t,” Toth said. “At gun shows, online…we’ve got the technology online, because if I want to sell a gun — ”
“What if some crazy guy…wants to go to a gun show?” Blitzer said. “He can go buy a gun.”
“First off, that hasn’t happened,” Toth declared. “If you look at that guy in upstate, he stole his gun.”
“But he could, technically, if there’s no background check, if he had a criminal record, he can go to a gun show and he can buy a gun without a background check,” Blitzer said. “Technically, that’s obviously possible.”
Toth said we should “stop dealing with the hypothetical and start dealing with reality,” but Blitzer continued to press the point.
“Right now, you can be on the no-fly list, you’re not allowed to board a plane, but you can go to a gun show and buy a gun. Is there a contradiction there?”
“Wolf, show me one — one time one of these criminals has gone to a gun show and committed a crime,” Toth said.
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Comments (196)
PROUD_2B_American
Jan. 16, 2013 at 9:30pmWhy does everyone keep saying “You can’t have an untrained teacher firing into a crowd” ?????
No one is talking about an “UNTRAINED” teacher
It is QUITE reasonable to a require every teacher or school employee to have training!
If a teacher wants specific training, how about we supply them with the best training available.
A well trained person, does NOT fire randomly into a CROWD!
They have the opportunity, to actually save lives.
They may never be able to stop ALL potential tragedy; but it’s quite likely, at the very least, they might buy time until police arrive.
Liberals never even TRY and see the good in an idea.
If one teacher had been trained and was able to stop him, and save ONE LIFE. Then THAT ONE teacher would have, ALONE, accomplished Joe Biden’s objective.
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southernsense
Jan. 16, 2013 at 9:27pmCorrect me if I’m wrong, but was the point of that interview to hear Wolfblitzer cut off his guest so many times that his guest couldn’t respond? I’m pretty sure that was the point.
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restoftheworld67
Jan. 16, 2013 at 8:50pmWhen is America going to wake up? The violence being committed in the US is astounding.
And all you can do is moan about what guns you can and cannot have.
It isn’t a total gun ban.
Look at the lives being lost day in and day out. And you criticise someone who is trying to change that.
That’s sick.
Enjoy your guns and your debate.
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Brownian-Motion
Jan. 16, 2013 at 9:12pmLong on blather, short on facts.
The US has lower violent crime rates than most of the rest of the world.
/irritating game show buzzer sound…
You lose..
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restoftheworld67
Jan. 16, 2013 at 10:27pmStupid me for having an opinion.
You’re right. Guns of any kind should be available to anyone.
No checks.
That sounds fantastic.
Haha…
That actually sounds absurd.
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sybilll
Jan. 16, 2013 at 8:40pmWere it not for the fact that the ObamaPhone lady has now said she is not pro-Obama, I would swear that ENCIMOM IS the ObamaPhone lady.
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MrKnowItAll
Jan. 16, 2013 at 8:33pmLOOK! The Islamist Arabs ARE HERE in the United States. I Give You my Word they are.
Knowing this. I Know our President is setting us UP. Don’t let HIM.
I’m sick of Our Government putting FEAR in Law Abiding Citizens.
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TimeForReason
Jan. 16, 2013 at 8:11pmAlmost everyone is missing the point. The right to bear arms came from the need to defend yourself from your own government if it goes bad or if you need to defend your family. Removing the right to prevent crime is irrelevant. The writers of the constitution needed to defend themselves from England. Seems to me Obama and our Government have already started taking away our freedoms in favor of their arrogant nanny state.
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2Alpha
Jan. 16, 2013 at 8:08pmI heard Huston at the beginning.
Hear Stanks at the end, PRICELESS
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JellyToast
Jan. 16, 2013 at 8:07pmHey Wolf.. what if congress passed a law saying black people were slaves again. would you support that law?
Hey Wolfy… what if congress passed a law that CNN was a terrorist organization. Would you support that law Wolfe? Would you defend people who wanted to oppose it?
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MacWell
Jan. 16, 2013 at 8:07pmWhat Glenn, and many others including T.H.D.’s fail to consider is the fact that Jesus, being God, blessed this nation since it’s inception. Now, does Glenn believe that God would’ve allowed the USA to become the greatest, most powerful nation in history by accident? God blessed America because of the fact that we the people of America, at our founding, established America under God’s laws. Most of the founders were, in fact, Christians, and prayed much before, during, and after their input to America’s conception. The men who thought up all of what we consider to be our founding principals, including fighting for right and freedom to the DEATH of millions, WERE, for the most part, Godly men. Do the Godless democrats believe in America? America, and Americans, have done more to improve the world during our short time in history than all the rest of the great nations combined, that’s not brag, it’s a fact!
The Godless on the left MUST believe that man is evolving, therefore, we must throw off those old relics of Christianity and the Constitution and become more like the “Star Trek” world of the future. Of course it is their right to believe however they will, as it is my right to believe that without God in America’s future, we will not have much of one.
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jas0707
Jan. 16, 2013 at 7:53pmWhen Wolf was challenged to deal with reality he conveniently ended the conversation.
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Wanderer66
Jan. 16, 2013 at 7:34pmMy friend Karl has it right. He thinks if we want to stop gun crime we ought to pass a law against murder.
That’s how insane this whole discussion is. We’re going to disarm law abiding citizens because that’s all we can do. And we have to do something to feel good. Well the bad guys are never going to follow the laws and all the gun grabbers are going to do is create a much larger victim pool.
If we get serious we’ll crack down on crime. And the Prez can start first in his home town by cracking down on the people in his old neighborhood in South Chicago who have no compunction with killing others, even children. I know it would take hard work and BO doesn’t appear to care to work at anything too hard. …And maybe the goal on the left’s part has nothing to do with really fixing the crime problem.
BO was elected with a little more than 31% of all American adults voting for him. Hardly a mandate.
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Johndeer
Jan. 16, 2013 at 7:32pmWolf: The federal government don’t have the Constitutional authority to regulate ANY private/personal transactions of any type. Especially to place the burden of background checks on the people.
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neverwaiver
Jan. 16, 2013 at 7:32pmEncimon; I just love to read your posts
Talk about selective hearing-NO ONE has advocated for a teacher or anyone in the schools
to have a weapon without thouroughly being trained.
BUT once again you liberals only pick and choose what you want to hear in order to
further the cause
Can’t wait til your all living in camps by the government waiting to be slaughtered
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stealthseesall
Jan. 16, 2013 at 7:22pmWhen are we going to have someone stand up and say plainly, WE WILL NOT comply any longer with any laws this zionist Govt creates and WE WILL MAKE WAR with this Govt to overthrow it and replace it with a new govt. WE need a CIVIL WAR…and the WINNER TAKE ALL.
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Dano.50
Jan. 16, 2013 at 7:07pmranepowel
“99% of abortions are done when the “fetus” is actually just a zygote.
So yeah, go ahead. Post pictures of all the millions of collections of cells that have been aborted before they became human beings. Really scary.
Seriously, if embryos are the same thing as human beings why don’t you try putting a whole chicken into a batch of cookies instead of eggs?”
Once again, the incredible stupidity of liberals rears it’s head.
1. Birds, unlike mammals, cannot not get nutrients directly from the mother because they gestate outside the mother’s body. The yolk of an egg is the food source for the growing embryo.
2. Chickens lay unfertilized eggs. Don’t know why, but they do. So unless a rooster, (That’s a male chicken for Ranepowel) has his way with a chicken, all that a chicken lays is an egg full of a food source, and one half of the chromosomes necessary to start life.
In other words, that one half of a cell, in that whole egg of cells, which will never, never, never, (Get it? NEVER) do anything but lay around until the egg rots, or is eaten.
And an egg CAN’T be fertilized AFTER the shell has formed.
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CapitalismCzar
Jan. 16, 2013 at 6:56pmWhy do Republicans go on CBS, ABC, NBC, or CNN? Why can’t Repubs figure this out? Wolf used all the code words: If a law is passed, Secession, etc. I hate what the media has become.
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AirtechJr
Jan. 16, 2013 at 6:55pmLet’s start with a COMPLETE and EXHAUSTING background check of Obama.
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sandrunner
Jan. 16, 2013 at 6:35pmwolf sounds like a girly man
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P8TR10T
Jan. 16, 2013 at 6:21pmWolf Blitzer = T W I T. I hope someone hits him with a hammer.
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marssnw
Jan. 16, 2013 at 6:18pmI would be willing to bet that more people have died at the hands of Obama admnistration (Fast and Furious and Benghazi) than at the hands of legal gun owners this last year. There should be a ban on democrats in this country. They are ruining this once great nation with their backwards ideology. Everything they stand for is a s s backwards.
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sharkee
Jan. 16, 2013 at 6:18pmWe need more Steve TOTH’s and STEVE STOCKMAN’S . WYOMING, UT, TX are all looking better
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denkat56
Jan. 16, 2013 at 6:16pmWhere was Wolfe during the fast and furious. People died there to Wolfe, you media types ignored it. How about Bengazi, 4 dead there where were you Wolfe. I guess you can pick what you want to argue about. The press like Washington should all be held accountable.
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TADTAD
Jan. 16, 2013 at 6:06pmThese Federal idiots can’t even track down moonshiners who have “lights, camera, action!” crews stumbling around the Carolinas and Virginia. I think I’m going to establish a little machine shop out in the woods and manufacture what the people want. I think I’m going to change my name from TADTAD to CrowdPleaser.
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The Big Mick
Jan. 16, 2013 at 6:04pmGlenn’s Logical Cleft Stick continued
I would suggest he KNOWS that he is promulgating a Falsehood when he talks about The Founders Long Suffering of Tyranny vis a vis our own.
But I would also suggest he is either in Clinical Denial, Guilty of Moral or Intellectual Cowardice, or, again, playing us for what he thinks is our own good, when he argues for Jesus/Gandhi Pacifism as the Obedient Theological Response to Tyranny.
A Biblical/Theological/Dogmatic case for Pacifism CAN be made. BUT, as C.S. Lewis points out, the Assured Endgame IS TYRANNY! In other words The End of the Jesus/Gandi Road is ENSLAVEMENT to be entered into with full knowledge on the excuse that it is the “more excellent way.” And NOT just for oneself and one’s family, but for ALL ONE’S NEIGHBORS!
The Thoughtful Student is also expected to follow the Logic all the way to a Rejection of ALL Violence including POLICE and to ponder the consequences in the Context of “The Good Samaritan” parable.
However, since before Augustine, and certainly after, the Theological Case has been made that Justice can REQUIRE violence, and thus, SOME Violence is a FORM of OBEDIENCE.
Obviously the Founders embraced the latter rather than the former, I call, again, upon Glenn to clearly delineate ON WHAT MORAL and INTELLECTUAL and CONSTITUTIONAL basis, consistent WITH the FOUNDERS, he would have us make a different choice.
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geomann
Jan. 16, 2013 at 6:03pmThe background checks should be universal: gun stores and gun shows should follow the same regulations.
There should be a “No Buy” list that includes criminals and mentally disabled people. The list should have a appeal process involving a jury of peers (if you loose the appeal, you pay the costs). Those who sell a gun to someone on that list (at the time of purchase) should be held complicit to any crime committed by the purchaser. Similar to vehicle code, the seller should be required to send in a release of liability form. Simple. Fast.
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