Obama: ‘We Should Be Ashamed’ Of Failure To Address Gun Violence

President Barack Obama applauds those who serve in Iraq and Afghanistan as he deliverers the commencement address to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point's Class of 2014, in West Point, N.Y., Wednesday, May 28, 20... President Barack Obama applauds those who serve in Iraq and Afghanistan as he deliverers the commencement address to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point's Class of 2014, in West Point, N.Y., Wednesday, May 28, 2014. In a broad defense of his foreign policy, the president declared that the U.S. remains the world's most indispensable nation, even after a "long season of war," but argued for restraint before embarking on more military adventures. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh) MORE LESS
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President Obama on Tuesday slammed the failure to curb gun violence in the United States.

“My biggest frustration so far is the fact that this society has not been willing to take some basic steps to keep guns out of the hands of people who can do just unbelievable damage,” he said during a Tumblr Q&A.

“This is becoming the norm,” he continued about school shootings. “We should be ashamed.”

The President addressed lawmakers who blame mass shootings on mental health, not access to guns.

“The United States does not have a monopoly on crazy people. It’s not the only country that has psychosis. And yet, we kill each other in these mass shootings at rates that are exponentially higher than any place else,” he said.

Obama said that he could only do so much from the executive branch and urged people to call on Congress to pass gun control legislation, criticizing lawmakers who are “terrified of the NRA.”

“If public opinion does not demand change in Congress, it will not change,” he said.

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  1. He needs to call out Republicans by name. All this does is contribute to the idea that both sides are at fault, when it’s 90 percent one side.

  2. “The United States does not have a monopoly on crazy people,” he said. “And yet, we kill each other in these mass shootings.”

    While put a bit indelicately, this is exactly the tact he has to take, well, that we all need to take. The NRA has taken unforgivable liberties in blaming this on the mentally ill.

  3. The President jumped all over this issue right after Sandy Hook and look what happened. The gun nut dem sympathizers stopped him including that a’hole Manchin. If Sandy Hook wasn’t enough to stop the NRA, then nothing will stop them until we elect people who will stand up to the scum sucking slime Wayne LaPierre. I wonder what would happen if tomorrow LaPierre is gunned down by a gunlover. I just wonder.

  4. Avatar for mymy mymy says:

    Well, did the Democrats step up and vote for the Manchin Toomey bill?

  5. Sandy Hook wasn’t enough to stop the NRA

    True. The wholesale slaughter of six year olds wasn’t enough. What may be enough is for someone to go into a maternity ward and slaughter a bunch of pregnant women, killing them and their fetuses.

    That might do it, but I’m still pretty sure the Republicans, forced with a “guns or fetus” decision, will take the guns.

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