Day: May 2, 2013

Immigration Could Lead to Armed Revolt

Buck Banks

One of the things that concerns my constituents — the majority of my constituents — is the appointments that are now being made in Washington by our President and the way he is handling the illegal immigrants, nationalizing them and giving them the opportunity to vote, and wanting to keep track of our guns. They are worried that they are going to have to use these guns because of our own government. Now is there anything in Washington that says — any telltale signs that maybe we might be headed for an internal revolution given the fact that these kinds of things are going on?

— New Hampshire State Rep. Edmond Gionet (R), quoted by Think Progress, warning immigration reform could spark a revolution.

Karl Rove Creatively Imagines a Way the GOP Can Take Control of the Senate

Buck Banks

The GOP has an outside chance of a Senate majority. To win, Republicans must also offer a compelling and substantive agenda for America’s economy, jobs, health care and fiscal situation that attract discerning independents (and the occasional disgruntled Democrats) on whom victory will depend. 2014 represents a great opportunity for Republicans: they’d better not let it get away.

— Karl Rove, whose PAC-backed candidates lost big time in the 2012 elections.

Why an Angry Obama Is a Good Thing

Buck Banks

During the chaotic week of the Boston bomb attacks, Barack Obama finally did something a lot of people had been waiting for: He got angry. In public. In the Rose Garden. It happened after the Senate had shamefully failed to pass a bill, favored by the overwhelming majority of Americans, requiring background checks for gun purchasers … To which I say, Bring it on, Mr. President. Obama’s anger served a larger purpose. It was directed at the plague affecting–no, paralyzing–our public life: the ability of well-funded extremist groups to thwart the will of the overwhelming majority. This is a problem that goes well beyond the gun issue.

— Joe Klein, writing in Time.

GOP Senator Says Background Checks Failed in Senate, Despite 90% Public Support, Because Republicans Want the President to Appear to Have No ‘Juice’

Jon Ponder

Two years ago, an al Qaeda spokesman encouraged jihadists in the United States to take advantage of the gaping loopholes in America’s gun laws and buy weapons at gun shows where there are no background checks.

“You can go down to a gun show at the local convention center and come away with a fully automatic assault rifle, without a background check and mostly likely without having to show an identification card,” Adam Gadahn advised al Qaeda followers in a video, before ending on an ominous note. “So what are you waiting for?”

Because of this, the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School and other attacks by crazed gunmen, polls show that tightening background checks to include all commercial gun sales is very popular, as high as 90 percent among all Americans and nearly that high among Republicans, gun owners and even among “members” of the NRA, the gun lobby’s marketing and lobby group.

So why did all but four Republicans vote against a bill to strengthen background checks? The bill’s tea-party sponsor, Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, told the editorial board of a Pennsylvania newspaper that his fellow Republicans voted against the bill, not on its merits, but in order to make the U.S. president appear weak and ineffectual so that he will have little influence over the outcome of the midterm congressional elections next year:

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