President Obama to announce his picks for Defense and the CIA today.
The Boehner coup attempt was bigger than we knew.
Meanwhile, Boehner continues to blame the President for the breakdown on tax negotiations.
Sen. Mitch McConnell says "The Tax Issue Is Finished."
The Washington Post reports the White House is working on big plans for gun control.
Hillary Clinton comes back to work today.
Obama's 2008 campaign gets a hefty fine from the FEC.
Salvage crews manage to hook that runaway rig in Alaska to a tow line.
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Republicans against Hagel for defense secy? Just another example that they eat their own. Lindsay Graham say's he's out of the mainstream. WHAT? Him talking about Hagel being out of the mainstream is like saying he's a flaming liberal. I'll bet Hagel is'nt in the pocket of people like the Koch bros.
Lindsey is afraid of being primaried by the Tea Party...and he has no real friends in this world. Being a gay Republican could probably account for that feeling of dread and self-loathing enough to stab a former colleague in the back?
Fabulous story on Dick Morris. Intelligent way to cut him to pieces. I love your intellect!
I have an idea regarding gun control and thought I'd share it with you fine folk. What if we banned the private sale of used guns? Create state-run stores and make them the hub of the secondary market. Primary sales from dealers can continue because dealers already make background checks. It would give every gun seller a guaranteed buyer, and the state can check the serial # as well as do the background checks (no ones' privacy is compromised) before the gun goes back into circulation. This idea was not immediately shot down by vigorous 2nd Amendment rights lovers that I know. What do you think?
Interesting. Sort of like state-run liquor stores in some parts of the country that also act as revenue generators.
I'm not sure if it would stop the black market for street guns but it could over time make them less available particularly if gun show background checks were rigorously enforced. I don't know if it would be cost effective, but certainly worth looking into.
Did you mean to establish these stores instead of allowing gun shows? I don't think the 2nd Amendment crowd would like that.
Not sure if we need state run stores, as there are already a lot of established dealers that operate under appropriate ATF and other laws. As someone who has a handful of guns myself, mostly inherited from family members, I do have a basic familiarity of gun shops. I can't imagine selling to just anyone, but I think a good model would be that if I wanted to sell to my friend Jim (example, obviously), that we would go to one of these gun shops where they run the background check on Jim and record the serial numbers, just like he was getting one directly from the shop. The basic background check is $10, so add $20 for the store's profit and say $10-20 for each gun's serial number to be inserted into a national database or whatever to make sure it isn't hot and to allow for the store's profit. If Jim didn't pass then I could sell to the store itself at fair market value, something a state run store might not do. I don't think that the state run store idea would be too popular but this might work, as it would be more in line with free market principles.
As someone who enjoys the shooting sport, I will say that the unchecked sales at gun shows and private sales scare me big time. These must be closed no matter what else is passed. Limiting high capacity magazines should also be a major part of anything new.
I think it is a great idea. At least for the time being, it will help us to save our kids from danger. This will give states more responsibility, revenue, transparency, accountability, and most importantly eliminate private party’s irresponsibility and income earning motivation.
I don't know about anyone else, but I am so sick of the Republican Party and their talking points, "the President hasn't provided leadership", every Republican on whatever news show you want to watch, same old, same old. What does President Obama have to do to demonstrate "leadership"? Isn't it enough that the majority of people ELECTED President Obama as our leader? Talk about lack of leadership, just look at the Republican run House of Representatives. It's like herding cats! Now there is a REAL example of lack of leadership.
McConnell became irrelevant when he introduced a bill a month ago and then immediately filibustered it himself.
The corporate media in this country is doing such a poor job of weeding out all this unnewsworthy GOP filler from the Karen Hughes Newswire that they are becoming about as trivial as the media in the Soviet Union was.
Nobody took anything reported in Russia seriously and only tuned it on for weather reports. It's sort of gone back to that since Putin gained power again.
Odduck: It's not the honesty of the claim but the fact that it is repeated again, and again, and . . . well, you know. If you hear it a hundred times a day it must be true, right?
And, besides, they are only talking about President Obama -- not someone who is really important. /snark/
"Even with 24 members, the group would easily have been able to force a second ballot round, but the effort was aborted in frenetic discussions on the House floor."
The Tea Party anarchists were to busy rounding up votes against the Hurricane Sandy relief bill?
Besides, they like seeing Boehner as a punching bag. And they didn't want one of their own like Cantor or Ryan taking on responsibility for their continued one crisis after another strategy and chaotic behavior as Speaker?
Another way way to work around the NRA on the micro level is to look at the issue of firearms and ammunition sold in public facilities. I'm working on a new group: Stop Gun Shows in Public Places!
http://www.facebook.com/StopGunShowsInPublicPlaces
We are having success here in Austin, Texas - of all places - getting our city and county representatives to reconsider renting the Expo Center for 9 scheduled gun shows over the next year. It could come up for a vote as early as tomorrow.
After Sandy Hook, I was shocked to discover 8 gun shows took place in the Expo Center in 2012. AR-15 Assault Rifles and over-sized clips are regularly sold. Person to person or "collector" sales do not require a background check. On a whim I decided to speak to the County Commissioners at their meeting just before the holiday (I was one of only four people in the audience) and I expressed my horror that we were allowing this activity, including the sale of these high powered weapons, to take place on public property. I asked whether this was an appropriate use of public facilities.
Apparently, it struck a nerve. We have action pending by both county and city officials. The county could vote as early as tomorrow to withdraw from the contract with the gun show vendor!
In Texas, state law forbids local governments from placing any restrictions on the sale of weapons sold at gun shows - so a community is either "all-in" or "all-out" when it comes to hosting these events.
Activists and public officials outraged by Sandy Hook may wish to look at this as a small but obtainable goal. Cities and counties do have control over how their taxpayer funded facilities are used. Dropping a lease to a gun show vendor does not violate the 2nd Amendment. It does not impact the rights of gun retailers and it does not keep gun shows from taking place in private facilities...But it does allow local government to make a statement: proliferation of assault weapons and use of the gun show loophole are threats to public safety and do not deserve publicly funded support.
RE. hefty fine. Almost 1.6 million in obscene profits for the prez? The FEC should have taken the whole 1.9 million and put it to the national debt.