Executive orders on gun control?
by Greg Krehbiel on 15 January 2013
There seems to be a spin in the news to the effect that President Obama is trying to bypass Congress and implement “gun control” by executive order. E.g., this article from Politico …
The White House has identified 19 executive actions for President Barack Obama to move unilaterally on gun control, …
“Move unilaterally on gun control.” Ooooh. That sounds ominous. What happened to Democracy? Who is this tyrant?
Not so fast. It seems that the “executive order” portion of his gun control initiative involves enforcing existing laws — which we should be doing. That’s what executives are for, right?
The executive actions could include giving the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention authority to conduct national research on guns, more aggressive enforcement of existing gun laws and pushing for wider sharing of existing gun databases among federal and state agencies, members of Congress in the meeting said.
Those things seem soundly within the President’s authority.
-- 2013-01-15 » Greg Krehbiel
15 January 2013 @ 10:18 am
Greg,
When I read that article earlier today, I had the same thought – those things mentioned sounded like they were actually within his authority.
15 January 2013 @ 10:20 am
What a concept! I’m no Obama fan, but a government official who actually stays within his authority — he ought to get a medal!
15 January 2013 @ 9:06 pm
Well, knowing this administration, I’m waiting to see if they figure out a way to raise more “revenue”. Never let a crisis go to waste dontcha know.
17 January 2013 @ 5:35 pm
While that’s true as far as it goes, it’s also true (at least by implication) that up until now, existing law has nor been enforced.
IOW, while it”s not the Constitution-shredding implied on some Facebook hand-waving, it at least does represent a change in policy of some kind.
Now if we could enforce existing labor laws, existing environmental laws….