Barack Obama on gun control regulation

October 8, 7:29 PMTampa Politics ExaminerJim Stillman

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Some of the issues relating to Federal gun control have, in the light of the Supreme Court in District of Columbia v Heller, decided last summer, have been constitutional decided in a manner not in agreement with Senator Obama.  In adopting  one of two interpretations of the Second Amendment, gun laws to restrict weapons in urban areas have been taken from the equation,

•  Senator Obama has spoken of his belief that there should be a balance between the expectations of the people to be able to carry weapons for sport, hunting and, in some locales, self defense.
• Senator Obama believes that bans by local officials, more familiar with conditions on the ground, are proper and should be strengthened. (This is contrary to the Heller ruling.) He feels that guns have no place in inner cities
• Obama would prohibit or strongly regulate the sale and distribution of automatic and semi-automatic “assault” weapons, guns developed and designed for the sole purpose of killing people.
• Senator Obama seeks a balance of the two conflicting traditional values in the United States. On the one hand, he speaks of a tradition of handgun ownership and gun ownership generally. He recognizes that many law-abiding citizens use guns for hunting, for sportsmanship, and for protecting their families. On the other hand, we also have a violence on the streets that is the result of illegal handgun usage. He says that it is reasonable for a community wanting to crack down on the various loopholes that exist in terms of background checks for children and the mentally ill.

In short Senator Obama wants reasonable, common sense regulations. And this might require a 180° shift in the Supreme Court’s philosophy.

I will further discuss the background and complexities and ramifications of gun control laws in a subsequent post