Here was the actual question she asked the President:

"why can’t your administration see that these restrictions that you’re putting to make it harder for me to own a gun, or harder for me to take that where I need to be is actually just making my kids and I less safe?”

I also don't see how he dodged her question... he pretty specifically answered it.

@3:

And that applies to gun laws in the United States - how, exactly?

I must remember to not read any posts re guns in the US. They are often just too sad to comprehend.

There's a reason gun manufacturers forced Congress to cut the CDC's budget by precisely the amount spent researching the impact guns have on owner safety. I imagine the tobacco companies would have pulled the same trick regarding the impact of cigarettes on health, had they the clout.

Protip: When someone is in the business of selling X, they will never ever agree that buying less of X is a good idea. We all understand that, and treat statements made by shills with the appropriate skepticism... for everything except guns. No idea why a substantial portion of the country has a ginormous blind spot there.

@7: The tobacco companies have tons of clout, they spend ungodly more than the NRA and gun manufacturers on lobbying and campaign financing.

The difference is that Americans like guns a lot, do not like the idea of changing the bill of rights, and there has not been decades of public health initiatives to teach people how dangerous guns are.

Tobacco companies are seen as death merchants by the public, and gun makers are not. It is a public perception problem, not one of the NRA buying votes.

@7: Oh, and the tobacco companies did do that, for years. Until the public stopped believing them. Then it became pointless.

Here's what the President should have said:
"Okay ma'am. Are you a convicted felon? No? Do you have a history of serious mental illness or a restraining order out against you? No? Okay then; the measures in enacting won't make it any harder for you to get a gun. Now statistically, having a gun in the home makes you less safe. But if you want to take your chances, nothing I'm doing here will make it any more difficult for you to do so."

So many people are just nitwits, though. And as we all know, facts are no match for confirmation bias.

@8: Clout =/= money, and I made no claims about buying votes. It is the NRA's command of a group of single-issue voters that gets those laws passed, not bribes. And the Bill of Rights was only recently changed to create a private "right" to gun ownership:

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/20…

Agree that some Americans love guns, though. See above re: the single-issue voter. Therein lies the ginormous blind spot.

She clearly wasn't listening to her because he specifically told her that SHE WOULDN'T BE AFFECTED. No one will be coming to take her guns. No one will stop her from purchasing more guns if she passes appropriate background checks. She will be just as free after Obama's plans go into effect to put her family's lives at risk as she was before.

A gun can kill someone trying to kill me, and that would not only make me not only feel safer but actually be safer.

^^^^ This sentence should be taken out back and shot.

@14, or much more likely, it can kill you or any member of your family. That would make you less safe.

"He didn't engage my ludicrous hypothetical scenario that was the basis of my non-question! He dodged!"

@15: It is pretty horribly malformed. It would be a mercy.

Fuck-tons of Gun Owners are walking around convinced that there are upwards of 3 million Defensive Gun Uses EVERY YEAR. >8,000/day, because Gary Kleck wrote a shit paper with those numbers 20 fucking years ago. The CDC funded a "review" of existing DGU estimates, and now they wave that like a bloody flag, "proving" that they need their pistols to be safe. "The CDC said 3 Million DGUs every year!"

Bullshit. If there were 8,000 times every day that an American used a gun to ward off a threat (i.e. black teenagers giving you the side-eye), the police reports would be filled with it. The whole country would be New Orleans. Our homicide rate would be astronomical.

http://www.armedwithreason.com/debunking…

@20: keep flogging that dead horse, but take your meds 1st.

Do you think she really is a sexual assault victim?

@14 how many people are trying to ....oh, never mind.

@19:

How many Christian Churches are there in the United States?

How many times have you heard of any murders by Christian terrorists occurring in the United States?

...you know, it seems like being able to purchase a firearm of my choosing, and being able to carry that wherever my — me and my family are...

Notice that she isn't interested in getting a weapon just big enough to stop her attacker (if that's what it would do). She wants a firearm "of her choosing." Would a bazooka do? Sorry the lady was attacked and no longer feels safe, etc., but she sounds like an NRA plant.

Meanwhile, Texas is now allowing visitors to one of its psychiatric institutions to open-carry their guns with them. It sounds like satire, but it's not. And as a guy with a mental illness who has to live in Texas for another year and a half, that freaks me the fuck out.

@20: I know you are clinically insane, and I hope you're making progress in your therapy, but I hope you are aware that that link has literally nothing whatsoever to do with gun control.

The NRA's "don't you want a gun to protect yourself?" argument is asinine, but for some reason gun nuts can't see it. Unless you transfer the argument to a non-handgun scenario.

Example: I was recently in a car accident when some careless driver rear-ended me at high speed. My car was totaled, and I was significantly injured (though on my way to a complete recovery!). I totally saw the guy coming in my mirror, but as I was stopped there was nothing I could do in the second before he hit me.

Now if you asked me in that second "do you want a button on your car that would disintegrate that truck?" I would have said yes. I did not know in that second whether I would survive, my life was endangered by a careless idiot, and I would rather he go than me. My actions would even be legally justified as self-defense. Thus, all cars should be equipped with disintegration death rays, right?

Well, no. It doesn't take a genius to see that installing automotive death rays would be a terrible idea. Road rage incidents would probably cause hundreds of thousands of deaths per year. Police would be terrified to make a stop, as the car might decide to disintegrate the cruiser rather than pay a fine. This in turn would make the cops more likely to fire their own death rays, even at citizens who were peaceful. Even my own traffic accident might have ended badly for me: realizing that he was about to collide with me, the driver might have disintegrated my car rather than risk being killed himself.

In other words, the fact that I would want a death ray in a specific scenario does not lead to the conclusion that everyone should have death rays all the time. Same with guns.

Yeah the way she uses her rape as a cudgel to score a political point is...unsettling.

@22: "If there were 8,000 times every day that an American used a gun to ward off a threat . . . the police reports would be filled with it."

O RLY?

Marissa Alexander fired a warning shot to deter her abusive ex husband from attacking her in her own home. No one was hurt, and he admitted he would have hit her had she not been armed. She got 20 years.

Gun owners are well aware that self-defense can be tough to prove. If they successfully deterred a burglar or attacker by brandishing a gun, no shots fired, why on earth would they retort it to police and open themselves up to prosecution?

Naturally, this does not mean there are definitely 8000 defensive uses a day. But there is good reason to think defensive uses are underreported.

The argument for gun control can basically be boiled down to 'We want to make it harder for people to kill each other.' The main argument against it, as @14 illustrates, seems to be 'But I want it to be easy for me to kill somebody!'

Obama's little speech about gun control was pretty redundant.Try buying a gun in many East coast states.Obama's laws will never stop the illegal seller or buyer.Here in Wash.St. I-594 will not stop the illegal seller or buyer.I own a gun,I have NEVER been through a background check.I keep it loaded and I will use as Wash St. law allows.

@11: Can you prove that the NRA is directly telling people how to vote, and they are doing so? Because that is what you are asserting, but there is a big difference between posting a voting guide online and actual political clout. Which does pretty much equal money.

@24: Nice. Are their any other women you would like to cast doubts and aspersions on today for talking about their sexual assault? Gross.

@35: Seriously? What do you think lobbyists do? The NRA is hardly alone in "directly telling people how to vote"; they're just more effective at it than other interest groups.

@35: As a former NRA member, I got emails several times a week from them and they did indeed tell me how I should vote. They used to call the house too until The Husband, who used to shoot competitively, told them that we felt that it was as likely that Obama was coming for our guns as aliens beaming down and forcing us all to get gay married.

Gun control is about throwing people in prison who haven't harmed anyone. Saying otherwise is just showing your hate.

If anti gun actually bigots cared about safety, gun control would look very different. But no. It's about hating the sort of people that want guns.

That's why the very people that are quick to holler "victim blaming" at the slightest provocation immediately leap to accusations that she made up a sexual. She's a gun nut, so she deserves rape.

If you get caught driving an unsafe vehicle, you just need to fix it and pay a small fine. A minor "safety" violation with a gun, like having the wrong hand grip attached? That's three years in prison.

Gun control laws are punitive, and heap on draconian punishments for tiny missteps. Like the guy prosecuted for a straw purchase when transferring a gun via a licensed dealer with a background check. No one involved hurt anyone, nor had any intention of hurting anyone. They didn't intend to violate any law. Everyone involved had a clean record. But I'm sure anti gun bigots are thrilled that they had their lives ruined.

Meanwhile, killing people with a car earns little to no jail time. And you can get your license back!

And most gun nuts are in favor of background checks, provided they aren't expensive or invasive. And provided you don't get a false denial with no explanation leaving the burden of proof on the gun buyer.

Also, wouldn't it be great if felons trying to buy guns got arrested?

A denial should trigger a call the police. They should investigate, arrest if warranted, and if they don't charge the buyer with a crime, the buyer should get their gun.

don't call the police, they'll bring their guns