NRA Lawyers Massed on Border Over New Regulations

You had to see this coming, didn’t you? The Obama administration announced that they’re going to implement new “common sense” gun control measures. On their own. Without going through Congress. In apparent violation of the Constitution, the Firearms Owners Protection Act, separation of powers, public sentiment, political logic…ad infinitum. And as the sun rises in the east, the NRA announces they have lawyers sitting in lawn chairs on the federal courthouse steps ready to file their suit as soon as the ATF tries to implement the new regs. So is there any logic to this madness? Let’s see…

It seems pretty clear that these are the “under the radar” gun regulations the administration had been promising its cheering section in the gun grabber control community for months now. And the new measures are of a piece with so many other steps he’s taken to avoid little complications like, you know, getting laws passed by the legislative branch.

That’s the real problem with the latest announcement, of course. Obama knows there’s no way he’d get anything like this through the House. Even in the Democrat-controlled Senate, it’s an iffy proposition at best.

So if you’re the President and can’t get a law through Congress to accomplish something you – and more important, your far-left base – would dearly like to see, what’s your option? Simple. You order the federal regulatory bureaucracy to do it anyway.

But why stir up a hornet’s nest like this if you don’t have to? Can you say smoke screen?

Obama administration officials denied that the decision to proceed with the new reporting requirement or the timing of its implementation had anything to do with the controversy over and congressional investigation into an ATF’s Operation Fast & Furious, which allegedly lost track of more than 100 weapons suspected of being headed for Mexican drug cartels. Two of those weapons showed up at the scene of the killing of a Border Patrol agent in December.

And that wasn’t 100 weapons. It was closer to 2000. Just to be clear.

The ATF will demand that border state gun shops report purchases of multiple long guns so they don’t find their way into the hands of the Mexican cartels. That’s the stated reason, anyway. Never mind the fact that ATF agents have already testified that gun sellers who previously reported suspiciously large purchases were told by the ATF to look the other way and keep the guns flowing.

Before it was OK. Now it’s a problem. Before it was Fast and Furious. Now it’s a political liability.

And never mind that the term “equal protection” seems to have been lost on the Justice Department in all this. The new regs will apply only to border state gun shops? That’s OK. They’ll expand from there.

If they really do think (please, don’t make me laugh) the cartels are supplying their firepower needs at various border state retail gun emporiums, won’t the new measures simply push the problem north to other states like Oklahoma, Utah, Colorado and Nevada?

But those are just silly, real-world problems with the new regulations. This is different. This will help shore up Obama’s base. It gets people like the Bradys, the Violence Policy Center and Mike Bloomberg (MAIG) off Obama’s case heading into the election campaign. He’ll be able to say, in effect, ‘hey, you can’t say I didn’t get anything done on gun control!’

That it probably won’t stand up in court isn’t much of a concern. By then, BHO will either be starting his second term or calling Jimmy Carter to get tips on how to make retired life fun and rewarding.