Is Obama going to do an end-around, and defy the Senate on gun control?
Vice President Biden told White House allies in the gun control fight Thursday that President Obama will be announcing new executive actions on gun violence in the days after the Senate voted down a gun violence bill.
On a conference call with "stakeholders," Biden told gun control advocates that the fight is not over and that eventual action on gun control will come. Press were not invited to the conference call; a participant provided BuzzFeed with access.
"Look I know you're going to say that I'm just being an optimist and I'm trying to put a good face on this. But you know I've been around here a long time and we've already done, because of you, some really good things," Biden said. "Number one, the president is already lining up some additional executive actions he's going to be taking later this week."
After the Newtown shootings, Obama took a number of executive actions to expand research into gun violence and other areas favored by the gun control community. He took the actions without Congressional approval, leading to outrage by some conservatives.
If he does use the Executive Order, I'll be pissed when it first happens. But then I'll calm down, and remember that Democrats were in support of it, and the President ignoring votes in the Senate; and I know they won't mind when President Palin uses Executive Orders to get her way as well. At some point, the opposing Party comes into power, and will uses the same tools his predecessors used, and in some case, expand on them (like Obama did with FISA wiretaps, extraordinary rendition, use of drones, targeting American Citizens w/o a warrant, etc.).
Payback is a bitch. Remember that as you stand idly by, and do nothing.
