Texas Democrats Push For Obama's Gun Control

Some Texas Democrats are trying to impose themselves on Texas gun shows.

The Tarrant County Democratic Party’s executive committee is asking the city to make three key changes at guns shows held on city property: allow only licensed sellers there, require background checks for all gun sales there and require a seven-day waiting period for all gun sales made there.

“This issue is up and in front of us on the national stage,” said Tarrant County Democratic Party Chairman Steve Maxwell, who recently presented a request for change to the Fort Worth City Council. “Something needs to be done to curb the gun violence in this country.

“This is heeding the call of the president, who said we’ve got to start doing something,” he said. “This is the first step in making our voices heard on this issue.”

“Heeding the call of the president…start doing something…” That’s among the Texas Democratic Party’s problems. They continually put the leftist objectives of their national party ahead of common sense, and what Texans actually want.

There is a philosophical difference at work here. The Obama Democrats believe gun control is granting more power to the federal government to determine who may own a gun. Most Texans believe that gun control involves hitting the part of the target that you intend to hit.

Gun violence is trending down, and Texas is awash in firearms yet is not awash in crime in anything like the numbers that leftist controlled, gun-control mecca Chicago suffers. The president’s call is for more federal government say on firearms transactions, opening up the very real possibility of national gun registration. None of his initiatives would have prevented Newtown or any other mass shooting, nor would they reduce crime. But they would potentially make criminals of law-abiding citizens, and the waiting period the Texas Democrats want to impose may end up making Texans less able to defend themselves in a time of crisis.

For what it’s worth, Ft. Worth’s mayor is not on board with the Texas Democrats’ gun control plan.

“I know some have raised concerns locally, but so far we haven’t heard a widespread outcry from citizens on the issue of gun control,” Fort Worth Mayor Betsy Price said. “As a country, we should do our best to keep guns in the hands of law-abiding citizens and out of the hands of criminals.”

Indeed. But the Texas Democrats don’t get that. Their last nominee for governor, Bill White, was a charter member of Michael Bloomberg’s anti-Second Amendment group Mayors Against Illegal Guns — which is really just a group of leftist mayors who oppose gun ownership. The Texas Democrats keep hoping that their openly racist strategy of relying on demographics rather than issues will hand them Texas. It may, eventually, but for the foreseeable future, they’re just out of touch with the people of this state and don’t deserve to win anything here.