whether we are actually shook up enough by what happened here that it does not just become another one of these routine episodes where it gets a lot of attention for a couple weeks and drifts away. it certainly won t feel like that to me. this is something that, you know, that was the worst day of my presidency. it s not something that i want to see repeated. it hit close to home? absolutely. meanwhile, sales of firearms are dramatically increasing across the country since the shooting. organizers of this gun show over the weekend in virginia expected to draw twice as many people as a similar event. some gun dealers at the show were doing more business than they had ever done before. joining me new is the writer of that report. thank you for being here. you went to the gun show. give the viewers an idea of how big the crowds were.
the crowds were so big, the lines were out the door of the expo center where it was held, it went down the block and around the corner. organizers expected the crowd to be double of that last november. who were the people at the gun show? who are they? are they hunters? gun enthusiasts? first time buyers looking for protection? who are the folks? it s a diverse crowd of folks. hunters from rural virginia. couples from the suburbs of d.c., looking for handguns for self-defense, military veterans. one thing that struck me is the common sentiment that ran through the crowd. the latest push for gun control is misguided and some lawmakers in the media have unfairly scapegoated the problem. what lawmakers should be focused on are keeping the guns out of the hands of people who are mentally unstable. ha are the hot items?
significant process. when you look at some of these situations, the person clearly was troubled. now how do you stop a guy that wants to shoot his mother to get her guns. it s hard to put a sign on this. your thoughts? i m being gross here, but this is a horrible case. how do you stop a person with some mental ability for doing something really, really bad? what can the president do on guns? well, i ll tell you, the first thing is just because something, you know, a measure can t solve every single gun case doesn t mean we should impose those measure. one is to close the gun show loophole. 40% of guns are purchased at gun shows where there are no background checks required. if we tighten that up, i think that will stop why do we have to have gun shows? it s an oxymoron.
the gun rights groups or the entertainment industry. this needs to be a national discussion where we sit down and say these are our children. this is us. we are not trying to get you in the entertainment industry or the gun rights people. we are trying to protect all of us and can t we do common sense things to do that? that includes more gun control, better mental health for the troubled kids and also have a tone down of the violence in the entertainment. what are the policies on the entertainment? you can make money without showing blood on the screen. just ask george lucas in star wars that has shown a lot of fighting scenes and no need for blood there. what are the policy loopholes? we know on the guns it has to do with the ammunition and the gun show and assault weapons. what about mental health? you mean what can be done? right. the application of the background check to more than purchase of a gun at a federal
least, even in a pro gun state like colorado. i was surprised to her him say the legislature needs to have a debate. i should add upon the news that new democratic speaker of the house in colorado said the problem is, how do you define an assault weapon? how do you define this and that. i m not saying they don t want it to go forward because i don t know. but the point to your point is that democrats, i think, know they want to do something. it s what exactly should we do? i think there are a set of solutions to be had here. they both have to do with a weapon and with the human involved in this. so there are a couple of things. you got to close the gun show loophole. 40% of guns sold in this country are sold without background checktion or identification through private sales. you must do that today. the second thing is crackdown on illegal guns.