NRA ad targeting Sasha, Malia is �repugnant, cowardly� (White House)

DAVID JOHNSON · Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 12:00AM · 1054 views

NRA is Repugnant and Cowardly

We wrote this morning about a new NRA ad / Web site targeting the Obama children in an effort to list-build and fundraise off of the Sandy Hook Elementary massacre. More on that below.

The White House has now responded.

Via Reuters:

�Most Americans agree that a president�s children should not be used as pawns in a political fight. But to go so far as to make the safety of the president�s children the subject of an attack ad is repugnant and cowardly,� White House spokesman Jay Carney said.

In the new Web site and ad, the NRA asks why the Obama kids, Sasha and Malia, have Secret Service protection when most American kids go to school and have no gunmen overseeing their safety in class.

Apparently the NRA isn�t familiar with a little thing called �assassination.�

The NRA is clearly playing off of their CEO, Wayne LaPierre�s (a bad guy with a gun if there ever was one), roundly rebuked, even by Republicans, suggestion that we pay billions to put armed gunmen in schools across America to protect children (from imminent Soviet attack, fascism, the Borg).

But what�s particularly disturbing, beyond using the President�s under-age children as collateral damage in a political spat with their father, and beyond playing politics with the Sandy Hook massacre and the death of 20 children, is the fact that the NRA is using the Sandy Hook tragedy to list-build and fundraise.

Rich friends and elite schools? So the Obama kids are spoiled rich kids and elitists for having Secret Service protection against known assassination threats? Show of hands: Whose kids out there are currently being targeted by Al Qaeda? Come on, keep em up.

Check out the counter at the bottom right of the screen above. It keeps growing as the video goes on, suggesting that the NRA has benefited from Sandy Hook, from the mass murder of 20 young children. And they�re proud of it. Even gloating.

The NRA is the Face of Gun-nut America

The NRA likes to pretend that they represent reasonable Joe and Jane Gun owner America. They don�t. The NRA is to gun owners what the Family Research Council is to Christians. Both attempt to mainstream extremism by using normal Americans (be they Christians or gun owners) as political beards.

They represent �Sandy Hook hoax� America. Crazy America. Violent America. Gun fetish America.

I think the NRA made a huge mistake in going after the President�s children.

NY Post on NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre
President Obama is rightly criticized for not always sticking to his political guns, as it were. And some of the criticism is valid. While I think he�s done a much better job the past few years, the first few of his term were definitely more wobbly. But one thing we learned early on with this President is that he�s fiercely loyal to those closest to him. The President may or may not have been truly ginned up for a fight with the NRA post- Sandy Hook, it might have been all for show. But now that the NRA was invited to his house to talk peace only last week, and has returned the favor by targeting his underage daughters, this may be a whole new ballgame.

To paraphrase LaPierre�s insane, roundly-criticized, press conference following Sandy Hook: The only thing that can stop a bad guy with guns is a good guy with kids.

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DAVID JOHNSON LA, CA

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DAVID JOHNSON Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 12:08AM

they have went crazy its time to rally the troops in the white house and show who[s really running this country ,,,

DAVID JOHNSON Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 12:08AM

they have went crazy its time to rally the troops in the white house and show who[s really running this country ,,,

DAVID JOHNSON Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 12:24AM

I really dont think he is going to take this sitting down ,,,something is going to go down ,,he is going to hit them hard ,,,we need to get ready to gight ,,,**** is going to hit the fan

DAVID JOHNSON Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 1:02AM

About a month after the school shooting in Newtown, President Obama announced some of his plans to tackle the country�s gun violence. Reiterating the need to be proactive, Obama also signed 23 executive actions as a starting point for his efforts.

The list of actions includes lowering barriers to effective background checks and addressing mental health. Here�s the list:

1. Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal agencies to make relevant data available to the federal background check system.
2. Address unnecessary legal barriers, particularly relating to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, that may prevent states from making information available to the background check system.
3. Improve incentives for states to share information with the background check system.
4. Direct the Attorney General to review categories of individuals prohibited from having a gun to make sure dangerous people are not slipping through the cracks.
5. Propose rulemaking to give law enforcement the ability to run a full background check on an individual before returning a seized gun.
6. Publish a letter from ATF to federally licensed gun dealers providing guidance on how to run background checks for private sellers.
7. Launch a national safe and responsible gun ownership campaign.
8. Review safety standards for gun locks and gun safes (Consumer Product Safety Commission).
9. Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal law enforcement to trace guns recovered in criminal investigations.
10. Release a DOJ report analyzing information on lost and stolen guns and make it widely available to law enforcement.
11. Nominate an ATF director.
12. Provide law enforcement, first responders, and school officials with proper training for active shooter situations.
13. Maximize enforcement efforts to prevent gun violence and prosecute gun crime.
14. Issue a Presidential Memorandum directing the Centers for Disease Control to research the causes and prevention of gun violence.
15. Direct the Attorney General to issue a report on the availability and most effective use of new gun safety technologies and challenge the private sector to develop innovative technologies
16. Clarify that the Affordable Care Act does not prohibit doctors asking their patients about guns in their homes.
17. Release a letter to health care providers clarifying that no federal law prohibits them from reporting threats of violence to law enforcement authorities.
18. Provide incentives for schools to hire school resource officers.
19. Develop model emergency response plans for schools, houses of worship and institutions of higher education.
20. Release a letter to state health officials clarifying the scope of mental health services that Medicaid plans must cover.
21. Finalize regulations clarifying essential health benefits and parity requirements within ACA exchanges.
22. Commit to finalizing mental health parity regulations.
23. Launch a national dialogue led by Secretaries Sebelius and Duncan on mental health.
Additionally, Obama proposed limits on high-capacity magazines and an assault weapons ban among measure he�d like Congress to pass.

Steve Williams Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 2:12AM

Here's what bothers me most about this business. The kids are pawns on both sides. Pawns of the NRA, pawns of the Whitehouse.

Steve Williams Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 2:23AM

I have 5 sons, 3 grandsons, 2 granddaughters, nieces, nephews, grandnieces, grandnephews. The least of my concerns is assault 'type' weapons in the hands of the population. Real assault weapons in the hands of the military and police, drones, weapons of mass destruction of all types, and the ultimate weapon of mass destruction, now in the hands of the powerful, unstoppable powers of the world, THE WEATHER. If only I could explain to those 4 kids that wrote those letters, and ask them what they think about THAT!

Steve Williams Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 2:30AM

The children are innocent. The adults are not.

Steve Williams Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 2:33AM

Sorry. How could I leave out economic warfare?

Steve Williams Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 2:44AM

Now let me comment on the executive orders. Why no order to the CDC to study the mass psychosis of this country produced by: video games, TV, movies, music, the MEDIA?

Steve Williams Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 2:52AM

David, thanks for the post and excuse my raving. That NRA clip was the last straw.

Steve Williams Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 4:13AM

Irma, I say the kids are pawns because though traumatized by Sandy Hook that doesn't protect them from being used by the same adults who see no problem with:

The million-dollar weapon

Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from the sea flattened Libyan defenses over the weekend. The $1.41 million missile has become a staple of the Pentagon's war arsenal. Missile-maker Raytheon posts this photo of a submarine-fired Tomahawk on its website.

Libya missile assault cost quarter billion dollars
By Sharon Weinberger 10:00 am, March 25, 2011 Updated: 7:07 am, April 11, 2011

In the opening days of the assault on Libya, the United States and the United Kingdom launched a barrage of at least 161 Tomahawk cruise missiles to flatten Moammar Gadhafi�s air defenses and pave the way for coalition aircraft.

In fiscal terms, at a time when Congress is fighting over every dollar, the cruise missile show of military might was an expenditure of nearly a quarter of a billion dollars. Each missile cost $1.41 million.

Raytheon Corp. is the manufacturer of the Tomahawk Block IV, a low-flying missile that travels at 550 miles per hour. During a decade of war in Afghanistan, Iraq, and now Libya, the Pentagon has increasingly relied on the Tomahawk. A year ago, Raytheon boasted of its 2,000th Block IV delivery to the Navy.

The 20-foot missile is particularly attractive for the military in current conflicts because it can be launched from submarines and surface ships at a safe distance and can be used to take out air-defense systems that could pose a threat to manned aircraft.

William Hartung, director of the Arms and Security Initiative at the New America Foundation and author of the book Prophets of War, said the use of the Tomahawk helps explain, in part, the high cost of the operations in Libya. �The no-fly zones in Iraq averaged about $1 billion or so per year, while the Libyan operation cost $100 million or more on the first day, largely due to the use of cruise missiles,� Hartung said.

�I would stop short of calling it a boondoggle, as it does seem to be getting the job done, just at a very high cost,� Hartung told the Center for Public Integrity.

Some members of Congress are nervous about yet another war, cost being one of their complaints.

�It is hard to imagine that Congress, during the current contentious debate over deficits and budget cutting, would agree to plunge America into still another war,� said Rep. Dennis Kucinich, an Ohio Democrat, in a statement. �Our nation simply cannot afford another war, economically, diplomatically or spiritually.�

Tomahawks have high accuracy rate

The Tomahawk was first used operationally in the 1991 Gulf War, when 288 cruise missiles were fired at Kuwait and Iraq to destroy Iraqi forces. The Navy claimed the missiles, which were used to target everything from air defense sites to Saddam�s presidential palace, had an 85 percent accuracy rate.

The low-flying cruise missile was used again, in 1998, against Serb forces, and over 325 Tomahawks were launched against Iraq that same year in Operation Desert Fox. During the Iraq war in 2003, the number of Tomahawks used more than doubled compared to the first Gulf War, with over 725 of the cruise missiles launched at Iraq, according to Richard Myers, then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

The Tomahawk, which is guided to its target by GPS, has tended to work well for fixed sites, like air defense systems, but perhaps less well for so-called fleeing targets, which depends on precise and up-to-date intelligence. In August 1998, President Bill Clinton ordered U.S. Navy vessels in the Arabian Sea to strike suspected Al Qaeda sites in Sudan and Afghanistan in retaliation for the Africa embassy bombings.

�Though most of them hit their intended targets, neither Bin Ladin nor any other terrorist leader was killed,� the 9/11 Commission wrote in its final report. �[Former National Security Advisor Sandy] Berger told us that an after-action review by [CIA] Director [George] Tenet concluded that the strikes had killed 20-30 people in the camps but probably missed Bin Ladin by a few hours.�

In some cases, it�s hard to judge the Tomahawk�s record: Amnesty International claims 41 civilians were killed by a U.S. Tomahawk strike against Yemen in 2009, but neither U.S. nor Yemeni officials ever confirmed the attack, which was reportedly directed against Al Qaeda sites.

In Libya, the government claimed the recent Tomahawk strikes killed 48 civilians, though those reports have not been confirmed.

Missile cost nearly tripled since 1999

From the standpoint of helping set up the no-fly zone, the Tomahawk�s use has been a success, according to U.S. officials.

The most current version of the Tomahawk has some noted improvements, most significantly its ability to be reprogrammed in flight via two-way satellite communication. It that sense, the Tomahawk is roughly similar to an unmanned drone aircraft, except that it doesn�t ever come back.

It�s not clear, however, how often its ability to be reprogrammed is actually used.

�In the real world, you�re just not going to have the sort of precise intelligence that would tell you, after you launch a Tomahawk and it�s halfway there, that now there�s a bus full of widows and orphans� and it needs to be diverted, said John Pike, the director of GlobalSecurity.org. �That just doesn�t happen.�

The cost of the Tomahawk has long been an issue. The Navy, according to a public fact sheet on its website, places the price tag of a Block IV missile at $569,000, but that�s in fiscal year 1999 dollars. However, Rob Koon, a spokesman for the Navy, on Wednesday placed the current price tag at $1.41 million, close to three times the cost listed on the Navy's website.

A spokesman for Raytheon, citing current operational use of the Tomahawk, directed all questions about the Tomahawk to the Navy.

Whether the increasing use of the Tomahawk will translate to more orders is unclear. The Navy declines to discuss inventory numbers, citing operational security, but in February 2010, Raytheon announced that it had delivered its 2,000th Tomahawk Block IV missile to the Navy. The company�s trademarked motto is �Customer Success is Our Mission.�

With $25 billion in revenues and $1.84 billion in profits companywide in2010, Raytheon is one of the five largest defense contractors and has benefited from the military�s increasing reliance on cruise missiles. Missile sales have also been paralleled by its lobbying effort. Raytheon, now the world�s biggest producer of guided-missiles, spent just shy of $7 million on congressional lobbying in 2010, compared to $2.32 million a decade earlier, according to the Center for Responsive Politics� OpenSecrets.org.

Raytheon has liberally sprinkled campaign contributions across Congress, including more than $2.1 million in 2009-2010. The contributions were balanced between parties, with 53 percent going to Democrats and 46 percent to Republican candidates, according to OpenSecrets.

Even in an era of staggering weapons costs, the price tag for a Tomahawk stands out because it�s only used once. So, is the Tomahawk worth well over $1 million a shot?

�They are expensive rounds, but they give you the potential to attack heavily defended targets up front,� said Barry Watts, a senior fellow at the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

�How do you value not putting a bunch of pilots in harm�s way?�

http://www.publicintegrity.org/2011/03/25/...

Steve Williams Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 6:37AM

That's just what I'm saying Irma, why do we only act out of frenzy? 20 children got shot yes, and that's what it takes to wake us up? Military style rifles only exist because of the military.

Remember when we were kids, they didn't even show dead bodies on the news

I still say, beat the swords into plowshares!

Steve Williams Thursday, January 17th 2013 at 6:46AM

I had a gun stolen from me. It wasn't an assault rifle, no high capacity magazine, just a six-shooter. I know who stole it from me and I wonder almost every day if it was ever used to kill someone.