http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/comment/2013/01/joe-biden-and-the-gun-control-debate.html?mbid=gnep&google_editors_picks=true
Interesting and kind of balanced perspective, considering the source.
Can Biden Stop the Shooting?
On Thursday, the day he was speaking with both the nominally and forcefully pro-gun sides of the aisle (sportsmens organizations like Ducks Unlimited on one end, and the National Rifle Association on the other), Vice-President Joe Biden paused during one of his meetings to sum up the work that his post-Newtown task force has done so far. After speaking for about fifteen minutes, Biden started wrapping up:
I will conclude by saying, in all my years involved in the issues, there is nothing that has pricked the consciousness of the American people, there is nothing that has gone to the heart of the matter more than the image people have of little six-year-old kids riddlednot shot, but riddled, riddledwith bullet holes in their classroom.
At roughly the same time that Biden was speakingsomewhere around 12 P.M. E.T.a new school shooting was taking place, this one at Taft Union High School, about a hundred miles from Los Angeles. There, one student was shot and critically wounded and another student targeted, but not hit, before two members of the schools faculty talked the shooter into giving up peacefully. It was, as these things go, relatively minor, and its likely that everyone outside of the affected community will have forgotten about it by next week.
Still, it was a reminder of the reality looming over these task-force meetings, and whatever comes after them. Given recent history, if the coming legislative debate over gun control takes more than a few months, it would be a minor miracle if it were not at some point colored by yet another mass shooting. Since 1982, there have been sixty-two mass murders in the United States. During that thirty-year period, there have been only three times1983, 1985, and 2002when the country made it from January 1st to December 31st without seeing such an incident. Last year, there were seven.
Theres a sense, on the left and the right, that after Newtown things will be different from the way theyve been after almost all of those other shootingsthat this will be the time when the government does something about guns. Supporters of gun control are optimistic that a new federal assault-weapons ban can get passed, along with a law against high-capacity magazines and another that would close the so-called gun-show loophole and force every prospective gun buyer to undergo a background check. Those against gun control are warning of everything from sweeping gun bans to confiscation of firearms by Presidential decree to outright tyranny.
Both sides are probably wrong.
There will be changes made to the way that the federal government operates when it comes to guns, that much the Obama Administration has made plain. The picture of those changes that has emerged from Bidens task-force meetings this week, however, indicates that they wont include anything radical; indeed, barring some incredible legislative breakthrough, it seems likely that they will be limited to a few incremental measures.
The latest round of gun-grabbing speculation on the right was set off by Bidens saying on Wednesday, The President is going to act. There are executive orders, executive action that can be taken, we havent decided what that is yet. But there was no need for pro-gun people to panic. A final decision may not have been made, but the broad strokes of what President Obama would do with only the powers of his office, and without congressional approval, have been made fairly clear, both in Bidens own statements and in the positions taken by some of the major gun-control advocacy groups that took part in the meetings.
One of the things that Obama is likely to do on his own is to work to shore up the database that is used to conduct background checks on prospective gun buyers. The law already requires federal agencies to submit records that contain information about people who are, for various reasons, prohibited from owning firearms, but at least some of those agencies havent been complying fully. In a letter to Obama sent shortly after Newtown, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, the organization co-chaired by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, called on Obama to issue an executive order requiring all federal agency heads to certify twice annually, in writing, to the U.S. Attorney General that their agency has submitted all relevant records to NICS. (There are other steps Obama could take in this area as well, some of which Biden discussed in his public remarks on Thursday.)
Obama could also, without Congress input, simply direct Attorney General Eric Holder to shift his departments priorities in order to put a new emphasis on prosecutions for violations of gun laws that are already on the books, but which are currently less than vigorously enforced.
Beyond that, the Presidents options are limited. He could potentially go further and, for example, ban foreign imports of certain kinds of guns, as George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton both did, but that ground has already been trod, and there have been no indications thus far that Obama intends to go back over it.
The rest depends on Congress, and it is there where things get tricky. Even if some previously anti-gun-control members had been thinking about bolting, theyre likely to think twice given the fighting stance that the N.R.A. has assumed on this, which it reiterated in a statement released after participating in one of Bidens task-force meetings on Thursday:
We were disappointed with how little this meeting had to do with keeping our children safe and how much it had to do with an agenda to attack the Second Amendment . We will not allow law-abiding gun owners to be blamed for the acts of criminals and madmen. Instead, we will now take our commitment and meaningful contributions to members of congress of both parties who are interested in having an honest conversation about what worksand what does not.
Both the Administration and gun-control advocacy groups remain publicly optimistic, though. This ones different. All the metrics are different . said Bloombergs chief policy director, John Feinblatt, whos been a point person for the Mayor on the issue and who took part in one of the task-force meetings. Referring to congressional opposition to gun control, he added, I think its fair to say that there seems to be an iceberg thats showing some cracks.
But as Ive previously reported, even a fairly popular gun-control bill like the assault-weapons ban would start off at least five votesand possibly as many as fifteenshort of overcoming a filibuster in the Senate. And in the House, the bans supporters would likely need to find a couple dozen votes, including at least seventeen from Republicans. It is certainly possible that gun-control advocates have a plan for how to get those votes, but if thats the case, they dont seem to have told anyone else about it yet.
Failure now would be more than a short-term setback for gun control; it would also mean wasting the best opportunity its supporters have to keep from losing the debate altogether. In recent years, Republicans have worked to make it very difficult, if not impossible, for the federal government to do research on guns and violent crime, or to fund any such research. Without that kind of scientific data to bolster their arguments, advocates for new restrictions on guns are at a significant disadvantage. On Thursday, Biden made it clear that he recognizes this, drawing a lengthy analogy to the auto industrys fight against similar research on car-safety data, and the improvements like collapsible steering wheels and air bags that were only made after the government won the fight over that data. The Administration can fix parts of this problem on its own, but others require congressional action, and thats a fight that will be hard for Democrats to win. But if Obama and Biden want to do more than just make small changes, if they want to make a real dent, theyll have to.
Interesting and kind of balanced perspective, considering the source.
Can Biden Stop the Shooting?
On Thursday, the day he was speaking with both the nominally and forcefully pro-gun sides of the aisle (sportsmens organizations like Ducks Unlimited on one end, and the National Rifle Association on the other), Vice-President Joe Biden paused during one of his meetings to sum up the work that his post-Newtown task force has done so far. After speaking for about fifteen minutes, Biden started wrapping up:
I will conclude by saying, in all my years involved in the issues, there is nothing that has pricked the consciousness of the American people, there is nothing that has gone to the heart of the matter more than the image people have of little six-year-old kids riddlednot shot, but riddled, riddledwith bullet holes in their classroom.
At roughly the same time that Biden was speakingsomewhere around 12 P.M. E.T.a new school shooting was taking place, this one at Taft Union High School, about a hundred miles from Los Angeles. There, one student was shot and critically wounded and another student targeted, but not hit, before two members of the schools faculty talked the shooter into giving up peacefully. It was, as these things go, relatively minor, and its likely that everyone outside of the affected community will have forgotten about it by next week.
Still, it was a reminder of the reality looming over these task-force meetings, and whatever comes after them. Given recent history, if the coming legislative debate over gun control takes more than a few months, it would be a minor miracle if it were not at some point colored by yet another mass shooting. Since 1982, there have been sixty-two mass murders in the United States. During that thirty-year period, there have been only three times1983, 1985, and 2002when the country made it from January 1st to December 31st without seeing such an incident. Last year, there were seven.
Theres a sense, on the left and the right, that after Newtown things will be different from the way theyve been after almost all of those other shootingsthat this will be the time when the government does something about guns. Supporters of gun control are optimistic that a new federal assault-weapons ban can get passed, along with a law against high-capacity magazines and another that would close the so-called gun-show loophole and force every prospective gun buyer to undergo a background check. Those against gun control are warning of everything from sweeping gun bans to confiscation of firearms by Presidential decree to outright tyranny.
Both sides are probably wrong.
There will be changes made to the way that the federal government operates when it comes to guns, that much the Obama Administration has made plain. The picture of those changes that has emerged from Bidens task-force meetings this week, however, indicates that they wont include anything radical; indeed, barring some incredible legislative breakthrough, it seems likely that they will be limited to a few incremental measures.
The latest round of gun-grabbing speculation on the right was set off by Bidens saying on Wednesday, The President is going to act. There are executive orders, executive action that can be taken, we havent decided what that is yet. But there was no need for pro-gun people to panic. A final decision may not have been made, but the broad strokes of what President Obama would do with only the powers of his office, and without congressional approval, have been made fairly clear, both in Bidens own statements and in the positions taken by some of the major gun-control advocacy groups that took part in the meetings.
One of the things that Obama is likely to do on his own is to work to shore up the database that is used to conduct background checks on prospective gun buyers. The law already requires federal agencies to submit records that contain information about people who are, for various reasons, prohibited from owning firearms, but at least some of those agencies havent been complying fully. In a letter to Obama sent shortly after Newtown, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, the organization co-chaired by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, called on Obama to issue an executive order requiring all federal agency heads to certify twice annually, in writing, to the U.S. Attorney General that their agency has submitted all relevant records to NICS. (There are other steps Obama could take in this area as well, some of which Biden discussed in his public remarks on Thursday.)
Obama could also, without Congress input, simply direct Attorney General Eric Holder to shift his departments priorities in order to put a new emphasis on prosecutions for violations of gun laws that are already on the books, but which are currently less than vigorously enforced.
Beyond that, the Presidents options are limited. He could potentially go further and, for example, ban foreign imports of certain kinds of guns, as George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton both did, but that ground has already been trod, and there have been no indications thus far that Obama intends to go back over it.
The rest depends on Congress, and it is there where things get tricky. Even if some previously anti-gun-control members had been thinking about bolting, theyre likely to think twice given the fighting stance that the N.R.A. has assumed on this, which it reiterated in a statement released after participating in one of Bidens task-force meetings on Thursday:
We were disappointed with how little this meeting had to do with keeping our children safe and how much it had to do with an agenda to attack the Second Amendment . We will not allow law-abiding gun owners to be blamed for the acts of criminals and madmen. Instead, we will now take our commitment and meaningful contributions to members of congress of both parties who are interested in having an honest conversation about what worksand what does not.
Both the Administration and gun-control advocacy groups remain publicly optimistic, though. This ones different. All the metrics are different . said Bloombergs chief policy director, John Feinblatt, whos been a point person for the Mayor on the issue and who took part in one of the task-force meetings. Referring to congressional opposition to gun control, he added, I think its fair to say that there seems to be an iceberg thats showing some cracks.
But as Ive previously reported, even a fairly popular gun-control bill like the assault-weapons ban would start off at least five votesand possibly as many as fifteenshort of overcoming a filibuster in the Senate. And in the House, the bans supporters would likely need to find a couple dozen votes, including at least seventeen from Republicans. It is certainly possible that gun-control advocates have a plan for how to get those votes, but if thats the case, they dont seem to have told anyone else about it yet.
Failure now would be more than a short-term setback for gun control; it would also mean wasting the best opportunity its supporters have to keep from losing the debate altogether. In recent years, Republicans have worked to make it very difficult, if not impossible, for the federal government to do research on guns and violent crime, or to fund any such research. Without that kind of scientific data to bolster their arguments, advocates for new restrictions on guns are at a significant disadvantage. On Thursday, Biden made it clear that he recognizes this, drawing a lengthy analogy to the auto industrys fight against similar research on car-safety data, and the improvements like collapsible steering wheels and air bags that were only made after the government won the fight over that data. The Administration can fix parts of this problem on its own, but others require congressional action, and thats a fight that will be hard for Democrats to win. But if Obama and Biden want to do more than just make small changes, if they want to make a real dent, theyll have to.
