Tragic shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School where 26 people were murdered, including 20 innocent children. Today the bodies of daniel barden, Charlotte Bacon and Caroline Previdi were all laid to rest as victoria soto who was shot and killed as she attempted to shield her students when when the shooter adam lanza open fired. Obama the fact that this problem is complex can no longer be an excuse for doing nothing. The fact that we cant prevent every act of violence doesnt mean we cant steadily reduce the violence. And prevent the very worst violence. Thats why ive asked the Vice President to lead an effort that includes members of my cabinet and outside organizations to come up with a set of concrete proposals no later than january proposals that i then intend to push without delay. This is not some washington commission. This is a team that has a very specific task, to pull together real reforms right now. That those of us who were sent here to serve the public trust can summon one tiny iota that those teachers in newtown summoned on friday. If cooperation and common sense prevail, then im convinced we can make a sensible and intelligent way to make the United States of america a safer, stronger place for our children to learn and to grow. Eliot the president focused specifically on three proposals that appeared to have significant and growing support closing the gun show loophole so that background check is required and banning assault weapons and ammunition clips. He was then asked why it didnt happen in the first team. This is not the first prolific gun violence of your four years. Where have you been . Heres where ive been, jake. Ive been president of the United States in an economic crisis since the great depression. Two wars, i dont think ive been on vacation. So you know, i think all of us have to do some reflexion on how we prioritize what we do here in washington. Eliot for more im joining by Michael Tomaski thank you for joining us. Always a pleasure, eliot. Eliot so did the president put jake tapper in his place with that rather succinct and abrupt answer and more importantly did the president with his strict timeline, the specificity and the sense of urgency that he gave to Vice President biden in leading this effort say i want something to put in my state of the union did he put something in the answer that jake tapper was entitled to ask. I do think that was a pretty good response from obama. He has been a pretty busy guy. But we also all know taking on the nra is a tough thing. It risks a lot of political capital, and the votes probably arent there. Havent been there for the last four years, still may not be there now incredibly enough. But now he knows he has to act. As for the timeline, i was impressed, actually. When i got up and read the headlines and saw that he was appointing a task force i rolled my eyes and thought, oh boy, six months later where is this going to leave us . This is going to miss the moment. But as he spoke, he was very resolute. He had the specific three proposals that you alluded to in your opening and he sounded just very resolved, and january is a strict timeline. I would count it still as striking while the iron is hot. I was impressed by the end of that performance. Eliot yes, i agree with each of the points you just made. I think an open question for me is will the Vice President come back with proposals that go beyond the three that the president articulated. I think those are good. They are the ones where there is the greatest sense of cohesive cohesiveness, with you, but as you pointed out, still not the certainty that it will go through the house. Do you think theyll go beyond those three . I would like them to go beyond those three. Im not sure into what, specifically but more into ammunition. When that guy in aurora, colorado was able to buy thousands of rounds of ammunition online. There is something wrong with that. That needs to be addressed i think. I would like to see him put six things out there and maybe get three at the end of the day. I think thats how you have to do Something Like this. Public opinion in favor of the basic dividing line between sports mens rifles and single action handguns on one hand, and these types of weapons that are only meant to kill large numbers of people on the other hand. Thats a bright line that the president can use and exploit and i think hell have tons of public support in doing so. Eliot i think the devision is one that is reflected in the nr a and reflected in the leadership of the nra and the membership of the nra the majority of the nra members would agree with you. Were experts sports men hunters we dont need the magazines with those types of bullets. What would wayne la pierre say on friday when they lift their vow of silence and speak to us. What do you think theyll say . I dont know. Thats a big question. The only hint we got was this little online chat that they had on their website. In which they made some noises, incredibly enough, about arming more people, and arming more School Officials which is just insane. Arming teachers, armingi dont know what. But if thats really the way they go, i think its going to be so self marginalizing and so selfdiscrediting. Youre right, there was a poll this summer, im sure thats what youre alluding to, about n ra members and twothirds of them believe there should be restrictions on the semiautomatic and automatic weapons. Twothirds of the nra members. But the nra leadership, theyre holding out for the most extreme element. If thats where they want to go and if thats where all the republicans in Congress Want to go, i guess they can block it, but boy they are going to pay a price. Eliot its not just that wayne la pierre is march i didnt knowallizing a third of histhathe represents, its the fringe rather than the vast majority of his members, below cede to him the control of an organization that no longer reflect the interests of those beneath it. It comes down to how will john boehner come februarymarch when the president presents a series of proposals will john boehner let them come to the floor or will he be held hostage last year it was tea part on finance this year, nra in the christians. Its hard tonra in the conference. What is your thought about this. John boehner reasonably in good faith now he has cut that off with planb, and he has basically given in to his caucus which i obviously told him we dont want good faith negotiations. We dont want you to make a deal with barack obama. Thats a precedence playing out before our eyes right now and im afraid to say that may be the precedence that we see. If this stuff had 70 Approval Rating in the american people, even among republicans, how are they going to stand in the way of it . I guess they can but boy, its hard to see how they can do it. I think that reason prevails at the end of the day on this one. Political primarily, driving john boehner to recognize he cannot be viewed, he cannot take his party over a cliff where theyre representing over millionaires and only the rabid right when it comes to gun. The two theologians have lost, Grover Norquist on taxes and wayne la pierre on guns, this needs to happen for the Republican Party. We need to be right about that. I hope so. If barack obama can chalk up wins again Grover Norquist and the nra thats impressive. Eliot michael tomasky. Thank you as always for your insights. Joining me now for why Gun Legislation is so hard to pass, paul blumenthal, thank you for joining us. Thank you for having me on. Eliot now, youve written fascinating stuff about where the power of the nra comes up, and its not money so much. It seems like a lot of money but you dont think thats the source of their power. Explain this to us . Well, they spend a ton of money on lobbying, they spend on Campaign Contributions and they seemingly spend a lot on campaign expenditures, but a lot of that is a drop in the bucket when you look at the fact that theyre made up of 4 million members, a lot of whom are hardcore singleissue voters. They go and make their voices heard. They call the offices they send in mail. The thing that powers them is not the money but their manpower and also a lot of mythology about their power that they held republicans win in 1994. That they caused al gore to lose the white house in 2000. A lot of that mythology has been built up both by the nra and consultants in the past who would say lets not talk about gun control. In a lot of ways that has led to an increase decrease of the gun control lobby who are running on less money over the past few years until mayor Michael Bloomberg got involved. Eliot i dont buy the notion that they caused al gore the white house, but the larger point that you make is that it is, in fact, boots on the ground, to use a military metaphor, but it is people power. It is almost gas roots activism. As much as we dont like to admit it, it is not big bad ugly money on the part of the nra they have 4 million members and they know how to mobilize them. Its an advantage that should be learned by the other side, by those of us who want gun control. Thats absolutely the case. They are a Grassroots Organization with a huge membership, whether it be the Brady Campaign or anybody else, has not really had. Maybe now after newtown that will change, were hearing lots of people signing up whether its mayors against illegal guns or other local groups, well have to see if they can transfer that into some sort of Political Force to get a bill through conference. Eliot you tell an amazing story in one of your recent articles about how the disclose act how it is a legislative response to the Citizens United case created a special carveout for the nra. Tell that story. It is such a remarkable manifestation of the nras capacity to twist the legislative process. Essentially you had a bill that was going to require groups to spend money who dont disclose their donors to have to disclose their donors. The nra said were going to score this bill. If you vote wrong on it, were going to give you an f. That actually is a really big deal to a lot of bluedog democrats, to a lot of republicans who might vote for it. The bluedog democrats were going to balk and not vote on this bill. This amendment basically said that certainly organizations that have been around for a certain amount of years and have a certain number of members you know raise only under 10 of their funds from corporations dont have to abide by this. That basically applied to maybe under 10 organizations nra aarp and a couple of others. Eliot when you use the phrase to score. When the nra said were going to score a piece of legislation were going it put this on our list of bills we really care about, and if you vote against it then youre scored against the nra membership. That scares congress. It comes from rural and pro gun states, and that seems to be changing with senator manchin and senator warner from virginia stepping back from those positions. Eliot the horror on friday hopefully is changing politics on. Is wayne la pierre, you have seen that the members of the nra are much more willing to embrace more gun control than wayne la pierre. There are surveys that show theyre far more in favor of sensible gun control than wayne la pierre and how they run the nra in washington. I think that president obama tried to speak to those members by not going after the nra, not attacking them, by saying that the nra people who are members of the nra, you know, support of a lot of these measures hes talking about. He doesnt want to come and take their guns away as the nra has said in their advertisements. Eliot right. That message was really directed at the members hey you agree with us. Eliot i think one of the more interesting moments in the politics of this spring is going to be on friday when we see how the nra reacts to the horror of the shooting in newtown. Thank you for joining us. Thanks for having me. Eliot is the Second Amendment history misunderstood . Thats coming up next. vo answer pour disaronno into a flute glass and top with prosecco. Brought to you by disaronno. Be originale. David the Second Amendment lives intense with the efforts who favor gun control to rid our society of ever escalating gun violence. The nra has always opposed meaningful gun control. You might think those statements are historically accurate. Theyre not. What the text of the Second Amendment actually means is one of the Great Questions we grapple with today and the nra until recently supported gun control and meaningful gun regulation. As law scholar adam winkler said the Founding Fathers instituted gung laws so intrusive that were they running for office today the nra would not endorse them. Adam winkler joins us now to flesh out the onedimensional view of history that has guided, unfortunately, our politics. Thank you for joining us. Thank you for having me. Eliot lets begin with the nra. You wrote this remarkable article, and then the book lays out the deevolution of the nra and gun control. Early on they fully embraced gun control, tell us about that. Thats right. It was not always the nocompromise that we know today. In the 1930s the nra were in front of the Gun Control Movement drafting laws that restricted the carrying of concealed firearms and laws that now challenge the Second Amendment. Eliot you alluded that they supported a law that required that no one carry concealed weapon in public without a permit. They supported a twoday waiting period before you could buy a handgun which was the waiting period, one of the things that is too radical for the president to propose right now. And require that gun dealers report to Law Enforcement everybody who was buying so you could do a background check. Its remarkable the nra, which was at the center of reasonableness has shifted, and what was the coup you described in recent years that led to this. Everything changed for the nra literally overnight in the 1970s. The leaders of the nra wanted to retreat from political lobbying, move the organization to colorado springs, where it could focus on Outdoor Activities and hunting. That angered the group of hard liners who thought that guns were about personal protection, not hunting ducks. Those members staged a coup, manipulating the rules of the membership, took over the organization, and recommitted it to the hard line political activism and an extremist view of the Second Amendment and the rest really is history. Eliot in a fascinateing tidbit prior to that coup in the mid 70s the Second Amendment has not even factored in their analysis and critique of gun control legislation when they were supporting it. They never cited the Second Amendment and no one worried what would run afoul of the Second Amendment because the Second Amendment permitted the reasonable steps that you were just describing for us. Thats right. Could you go back through decades of volumes of american rifleman the signature publication in the 1930s 40s, 1950s. You wont find any mention of the Second Amendment. Today youll see the Second Amendment mentioned on almost every other page. Theyve really changed their stripes and promoted an extreme extremist view of the Second Amendment that carves out no rule for gun control. Eliot the Founding Fathers in terms of access it goes awry to Justice Scalia, who is breathing into the Second Amendment the somewhat radical notions that you cant restrict ownership. There is a real tension there. How does he overcome it, and do you think hes fundamentally wrong . Youll get no argument from me with scalia being a false originalist. I think he was right in saying that the Second Amendment protects the rights of individuals to keep and bear arms for personal protection. Hes right. We have always had gun control. Its just as much a part of the story of guns in america as the Second Amendment and the six shooter, and it balances the rights with public welfare, and we can do the same. Eliot in terms of the false originalism of Justice Scalia, in the paragraph where you refer that even scalia recognizes there are certain exceptions and carveouts in the case that has rewritten our understanding of the Second Amendment her even he acknowledges there is no question that congress can legislate meaningful restriction with respect to gun possession in special places. Now i think thats right. I dont think its right that he articulates, but where does he find that in his originalist world . Does he read it in the amendment that the rest of us have been missing . Absolutely not. Its true that the Founding Fathers had gun control but they didnt have the gun control that Justice Scalia points to where he says of course nothing in the Second Amendment calls into question laws banning felons from possessing firearms or mentally ill possessing firearms. The Founding Fa