Last week, President Obama made an announcement about so-called smart guns, advocating for additional federal funding for the technology long opposed by self-defense advocates and law enforcement agents.
“My Administration released a plan today to expedite the development of smart gun technology, including by identifying the requirements that smart guns would have to meet in order for law enforcement to purchase and use them effectively — and keep themselves and the public safer in the process,” Obama said. “As long as I’m your president, I will do everything in my power to make our communities safer and keep guns out of the wrong hands.”
{mosads}Obama of course failed to mention his recent decision to commute the sentences of a dozen violent felons who broke federal gun laws in order to carry out drug crimes, but you can read more about that in my previous column.
Right on cue, Michael Bloomberg’s Everytown for Gun Safety backed the president, by publicly expressing gratitude for the move. “We applaud President Obama for taking this important first step,” Everytown President John Feinblatt released in a statement.
Just one day before Obama’s latest gun control push, Everytown’s latest celebrity spokesman Amy Schumer made an appearance on Comedy Central, where she performed a QVC style skit selling a gun.
Amazing how the White House, celebrities and gun control groups happen to repeatedly push for new initiatives in an organized fashion at the same time.
In the skit, Schumer is seen handling a real gun, with a magazine loaded and the chamber closed, tossing it around, pointing it at her co-host Kyle Dunnigan (who in return points the gun at Schumer’s head), placing her finger on the trigger and endless cringe-worthy, painful and idiotic moves. For those who aren’t familiar, the four gun safety rules are as follows:
1. All guns are always loaded.
2. Never let the muzzle cover anything you are not willing to destroy.
3. Keep your finger off the trigger until your sights are on the target.
4. Always be sure of your target and what is beyond it.
The disregard for these rules is negligence, which Schumer and Dunnigan displayed well. The skit received heavy backlash, prompting Schumer to take to Twitter.
“Hey journalists thanks for all the heat from last nights #endgunviolence message. Please use the term ‘gun safety’ instead of ‘gun control,’” Schumer tweeted after the episode aired.
How ironic. After breaking every rule in the book for safe gun handling, Schumer took to the internet to lecture her critics, and journalists, about gun safety.
On top of negligently and dangerously breaking all gun safety rules in the skit, Schumer made several gun control talking points that have been roundly debunked, including her claim that felons can legally purchase firearms.
“To be clear: The kind of transaction Schumer’s character describes is illegal. Federal law prohibits felons from getting a gun unless their rights have been formally restored,” PolitiFact reported about the skit.
But while Schumer and her Bloomberg anti-Second Amendment handlers attempt to further hijack the term “gun safety” as a cover for “gun control,” their favorite political target is providing real gun safety to tens of thousands of Americans each year.
The National Rifle Association has been offering gun safety courses to anyone interested in taking them since its founding in 1871. Today, there are thousands of NRA-certified instructors, and hundreds of gun safety courses are held every year in cities and local communities across the country. At the beginning of 2016, the NRA launched a new gun safety program online that allows people to learn about gun safety rules when their schedule allows, opening the door for even more students to gain the knowledge they are seeking. The NRA’s Eddie Eagle program, which teaches children to stay away from firearms and to tell an adult if they find one, has helped to reduce child-related firearms accidents by 75 percent since its implementation in 1988. All of this is worth far more than lectures about gun control or “smart gun” technology.
Not only do the Amy Schumers of the world and the gun control groups who support her fail to provide real gun safety lessons, they oppose them. This was recently displayed by comedian Samantha Bee, who openly mocked the Eddie Eagle program as “lame” during a segment for her TBS show “Full Frontal.”
The true gun safety advocates, as they have been for centuries, are the millions of members of the NRA and other training organizations. Schumer and Everytown should leave the issue to the experts — after all, they aren’t really interested in safety, they’re interested in gun control.
Pavlich is editor for Townhall.com and a Fox News contributor.