Republicans are in a fury as President Obama outlandishly lurches toward gun reforms supported by presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush.
Rep. Trey Radel (R-FL) joined Steve Stockman (R-TX) as the second member of Congress to suggest he might be willing to impeach the president for a series of executive orders he’s issuing to fight gun violence.
“We have completely lost our checks and balances in this country, the Congress needs to hold the president accountable for the decisions that he’s making right now,” Radel said, “and that is why again, I would say that all options should be on the table.”
What kind of power grab is President Obama engaged in after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary, which left 20 children dead?
His list of 23 executive orders includes radical actions such as, “Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal agencies to make relevant data available to the federal background check system.” He calls for guns recovered in criminal investigations to be tracked and even calls for Congress to approve his nominee to head up the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.
You know who else issued executive orders?
No. These guys.
Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and every president since Washington — except William Henry Harrison, who died a month after taking office. G.H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton both used executive orders to ban the importation of certain semi-automatic weapons. Neither was impeached. Well, not for that, anyway.
So would Republicans really impeach the president for launching “a national safe and responsible gun ownership campaign”? As usual, the Republican freakout meter is at 11.
“Rolling back responsible citizens’ rights is not the proper response to tragedies committed by criminals and the mentally ill,” Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) said.
Texas governor Rick Perry (R) echoed Rubio. “Guns require a finger to pull the trigger,” he said. “The sad young man who did that in Newtown was clearly haunted by demons and no gun law could have saved the children in Sandy Hook Elementary from his terror.”
The argument that no law can stop evil was once made by Ronald Reagan in the pages of Guns and Ammo magazine. “Criminals are not dissuaded by soft words, soft judges or easy laws. They are dissuaded by fear and they are prevented from repeating their crimes by death or by incarceration,” he wrote.
More than a decade later, after a gun had almost taken his life, Reagan came out in support of both background checks and later an assault weapons ban, providing the crucial support to get both written into law.
And now as President Obama seeks to renew that ban and expand background checks for all gun sales, Republicans are even saying that Reagan was senile when he supported responsible gun laws.
That’s how much Republicans hate President Obama; to fight him, they’re even willing to commit blasphemy against St. Ronnie.
