Tearful Obama Outlines Measures to Control Firearm Departures:

WASHINGTON: Tears streaming down his face, as he vowed to take actions to control the bloodshed with or without Congress, the gun violence which has reached across America was condemned by President Barack Obama on Tuesday.

“In this room right here, there are plenty of storylines. “There is plenty of resilience, there is plenty of strength, however there is also lots of pain.”

For each of the emotion he revealed, Obama still confronts political, legal and logistical hurdles which are likely to blunt the effect of the strategy he laid out.

Several the executive activities he strategies are merely proposed “guidance” for federal agencies, not binding regulations. They were framed largely as applying and clarifying existing law, not enlarging it. And a number of these measures rely on substantial capital increases a Republican-led Congress is practically certain to reject.

Among other measures, the strategy intends to define who should be licensed as a firearm dealer and therefore have to run background checks on customers to weed out buyers that are banned.

The government said it was not possible to estimate how many illegal firearms may be taken off the roads or how large an effect the measures might have many new firearm sales may be controlled.

The FBI manager, James B. Comey, said at the time that a dysfunction in the background check system had let Roof to purchase the firearm.

Obama expressed annoyance over the dilemma.

That believing is rejected by me.

We understand we can not stop every act of violence, every action of evil in the world. But perhaps we could make an effort to quit one action of evil, one act of violence.”

The most optimistic supporters say only a large number of sales would change.

The most ardent gun control supporters who now see an assault weapons ban or required firearm buyback programs like ones in Australia in 1996 and 2003 as political dream has for ages shelved suggestions that will possess the greatest effect.

Small as the new measures may prove to be, the result was not restrained. Republican presidential nominees and congressional leaders greeted them with peals of protests and furious claims of a “firearm catch” that would offend Second Amendment rights. They were hailed by gun control supporters as a breakthrough in what’s frequently been a losing fight to toughen firearms constraints.

The families of firearm victims and gun control activists packed into the White House and saw as he remembered the young kids gunned down by an assailant in the year 2012 at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut Obama break down.

He wiped his face and paused to recover his composure: “Every time that I think about those children, it gets me angry.”

By taking actions, a ferocious political debate which has roiled Congress and spilled over in the presidential campaign is being purposely stoked by Obama.

His tears were, mocked by the National Rifle Association, targeted by Obama in his address.

“The American people don’t want more mental, condescending lectures which are totally devoid of facts,” said Chris W. Cox, the group’s top lobbyist.

A caption read “Obama Needs Your Firearms” next to a fundraising appeal.

Speaker Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin posted his resistance on Twitter as the president spoke, saying Obama’s “words and activities amount to a kind of bullying that undermines autonomy.”

But Obama’s allies were extreme in their own defense.

So am I. One of the most moving things I Have ever seen.”

Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee, posted a “thank you” to Obama for “taking a vital step forward on firearm violence.”

Obama’s strategy will probably face legal challenges from firearm rights groups that accuse him of overstepping his executive power. Several critics said they guessed the president’s drive to “clarify” the definition of licensed firearm dealers could drive even the occasional firearm seller to register their trades.

Soon before Obama’s comments, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives released guidance to firearm sellers on the standards which could qualify someone as a firearm “dealer” who must be licensed and run background checks. Those standards include having a web site, using business cards, or selling firearms that are new inside their own original packages.

The 14-page pamphlet, posted on the service’s web site, offers examples to help guide sellers, like “Bob,” who needs to sell a firearm group which he inherited (he wouldn’t have to be licensed), and “Sharon,” who sells firearms at flea markets every weekend (she’d have to be licensed).

However, the government rejected more competitive alternatives, including building a defined threshold for the variety of firearm sales that will qualify someone as a dealer required to run background checks.

White House officials were not unmindful of the legal reversals endured when the president attempted to give 5 million immigrants in the nation legal immigration standing illegally, and they said they attempted to make the firearm strategy safe from legal attacks as possible.

“This is actually quite small material,” said Ladd Everitt, the communications manager for the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, an advocacy group.

While he commended for taking actions Obama, he said more needed to be done.

source: via