Obama's Two Americas

Earlier today, the Supreme Court struck down the Washington D.C. handgun ban that had been in place since 1976.

Here’s Obama’s response to the ruling:

“I have always believed that the Second Amendment protects the right of individuals to bear arms, but I also identify with the need for crime-ravaged communities to save their children from the violence that plagues our streets through common-sense, effective safety measures. The Supreme Court has now endorsed that view, and while it ruled that the D.C. gun ban went too far, Justice Scalia himself acknowledged that this right is not absolute and subject to reasonable regulations enacted by local communities to keep their streets safe. Today’s ruling, the first clear statement on this issue in 127 years, will provide much-needed guidance to local jurisdictions across the country.”

This would again, appear to contradict his stance on both hand-gun ownership and the death penalty.

Check out video here of interview back in February with ABC where he indicates that he supported the handgun ban.



So the 2nd amendment applies to Idaho but not D.C.? Would the 1st amendment also be similarly apportioned, Senator? The self-styled Constitutional professor’s pronouncements are becoming more and more incomprehensible.

Wait, it gets better: His O-ness, in an interview just today comes out and says the hand-gun ban “went beyond Constitutional limits”. Click here. It’s a Red Lasso video, were sorry but trust us… he did say it.

But its general election season now and so with every passing day and every passing Supreme Court decision we get another rightward tack to the center.

Exit question: Despite these seemingly significant policy shifts of Obama, do you feel any more comfortable that Obama would nominate judges in the mold of John Roberts and Samuel Alito or Ruth Bader Ginsberg and John Paul Stevens?

H/T: Hot Air and Powerline

UPDATE #1: Post at Kos acknowledges the Constitutional inevitability of hand gun ownership. "Sometimes in life (and in law), there are things that we might desire from a policy standpoint -- like certain forms of gun control, or restrictions on some election-related speech -- which are nevertheless forbidden by the Constitution."

HuffPo is having a little more difficult time with it, though.

"Instead, the Court fractured along an all-too-predictable 5-4 axis, with the five conservatives supporting the rights of gun owners and the four liberals (or, more accurately, "moderates") seemingly supporting the most extreme version of gun "control," which is outright prohibition."

Which, of course, explains why they are “moderates”.