Just before the President got busy signing firearms-related Executive Orders (a.k.a., “executive actions”) the White House attacked the National Rifle Association for the ad above. “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.” And effective. The NRA ad’s racking-up thousands of views. The White House condemnation has put it into rotation on all the news nets. Look for a version on the Nightly News et al. Meanwhile, the NRA responded to the Obama administration’s response . . .

“Whoever thinks the ad is about President Obama’s daughters are missing the point completely or they’re trying to change the subject,” NRA spokesman Andrew Arulanandam told usatoday.com.

“This ad is about keeping our children safe. And the president said he was skeptical about the NRA proposal to put policemen in all schools in this country. Yet he and his family are beneficiaries of multiple law enforcement officers surrounding them 24-hours a day. That’s the real issue. Anything else is an attempted calculated distraction.”

 

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76 COMMENTS

  1. I think the NRA owes President Obama a thank-you letter for legitimizing their video, and encouraging millions of people to watch it all the way through.

    One hopes that more than a few of those will clue in to at least a few of the concepts being hammered into their pointy little heads.

    • More than just that, the NRA owes Obama for giving them fodder for at least another generation of successful fundraising appeals.

    • WHAT HYPOCRITES! Actually, Obama and the rest of them are dancing in the blood of the children of Newtown, CT and yet they say that the “president’s children should not be used as pawns in a political fight.”

      I think we hit a sore spot and we need to tap that nerve for all it’s worth!

      • Yep, Christie is way off on this one and should have thought it through a bit more.

        The President is not a King; our children mean as much to us as his does to him. His children aren’t being targeted in “gun-free” zones like ours our.

        The president trotted out a bunch of children and exploited them for his purposes. Nice.

  2. Oh Yeah, and “The NRA IS RACIST!”
    Yea an Org. founded to help freed slaves become proficient with firearms is racist and cowardly

  3. But it’s perfectly fine to have 4 small children on stage while the POTUS addresses the nation on his “plans”…? Especially the little girl that knows laws have to come from congress..

    • My thoughts exactly. It is a bit disingenuous to attack someone for mentioning children in a video
      while in the next room you are using children as props in an attempt at forcing your political will.

  7. While I think the NRA video is unlikely to generate any additional sympathy for gun rights, I don’t get how it’s more cowardly than parading around pictures of the kids from Newton, CT as leverage to promote a disarmament agenda.

  8. Good reply by Andrew Arulanandam. Obummer happily used his children for positive family effect during the 2008 election and he has used the children of Sandy Hook (living and dead) as propaganda in seeking to advance his political agenda to eventually disarm American citizens.

  9. “Whoever thinks the ad is about President Obama’s daughters are missing the point completely or they’re trying to change the subject”

    This was my exact thought. At one point it even mentions “their kids,” because it’s not just Sasha and Malia that go to a school protected by armed guards. I’d wager that the school-age kids of most high-ranking members of Congress do similarly.

    • Nobody likes being called on their hypocrisy, which is why it’s so much fun to watch it happen to politicians of any stripe. Especially when it’s not for something they said 10 years ago, but instead it’s from the recent past.

      And I can’t WAIT to see the administration PR flacks flip out when the NRA (hopefully) starts a campaign pointing out that the executive-action package includes the exact recommendation that was roundly condemned as extremist… how many days ago now?

    • yup.

      bloody barack is a coward. he hasn’t even served in any military capacity whatsoever and is quick to surge troops in afghanistan and kill more children with drones.

      • We don’t live in a military dictatorship, and previous military service is not required to hold office. And I like it that way.

        I don’t think someone with no military experience should be SecDef, on the other hand., but that’s very different from saying that POTUS/VPOTUS must be honorably-discharged veterans to hold office. Down that path lies tyranny.

        • Maybe, but the modern President most skeptical of expansion of military power was Eisenhower. We could do with a few more Ikes.

        • After the things McChrystal and Petraeus have said and done lately, I’m pretty sure that Ikes are an endangered species, maybe even extinct.

        • Fair enough, making military service
          a requirement could be a quick way
          towards a military dictatorship.

          Robert Heinlein addressed this issue
          in a number of his books. He said:
          (paraphrasing for brevity) if an
          elected official is not willing to risk
          their life for a person or ideal how
          much can we trust their decisions
          that affect us.

        • and where did i imply that i supported military service as a pre-requisite?

          nowhere.

          and dictatorships arent always controlled by a leader with military experience. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saddam_Hussein

          that does much to undermine obama’s credibility however. just ask me, i was deployed in a combat environment when he was commander in chief. he was just as asinine as the previous dolt.

          “if an elected official is not willing to risk
          their life for a person or ideal how
          much can we trust their decisions
          that affect us.”

          yup. fortunately it is a volunteer army.

        • WLCE wrote:
          and where did i imply that i supported military service as a pre-requisite?

          Respectfully, I kind of think you did right here:
          bloody barack is a coward. he hasn’t even served in any military capacity whatsoever and is quick to surge troops

          It seemed abundantly clear to me that you were saying that if he HAD served in the military, you would not consider him a coward, and he wouldn’t have supported a troop surge.

          Does anyone BUT WLCE disagree with me?

        • “It seemed abundantly clear to me that you were saying that if he HAD served in the military, you would not consider him a coward, and he wouldn’t have supported a troop surge.”

          yes i would still consider him a coward even if he did serve. he would have definitely still supported the troop surge. anybody that dances on the graves of dead kids while killing muslim children in foreign lands is a hypocrite and a coward.

          perhaps its on me for the miscommunication.

        • The Hessian mercenaries were a “volunteer army” too, serving well the hierarchs for money. Sound familiar?

  12. If you want kids to use for political pathos, there’s an Executive Order for that: Call 1-800-SEIU-Kid. No more of this freebie reliance on the President’s kids. They aren’t union.

  13. I half expected the pres to line up a circle of mock coffins with each having a EO number on it. Then he could have jumped from one to another to explain. Add a hitler salute on the end & you got it, Randy

  14. “Most Americans agree that a president’s children should not be used as pawns in a political fight”

    So what? Its acceptable to use us “peons” in your political fight? We are just cannon fodder, and not important enough? Why is he allowed to have guns to protect his family and I’m not?

  15. I’m no fan of the NRA, but just to point out the WH hypocrisy, they made fun of the NRA for suggesting cops in schools, but then item #18 on the list was incentive for more resource officers in schools. Resource officer is the term for a uniformed cop assigned to a school.

  16. the only thing that could make that video better is if someone gets a kid to do the voice over.

    Using kids to push an agenda is the new black.

  18. ”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.”

    Actually, I don’t think ANYONE’S children should be used as pawns in a political fight. That is why the ring of kids surrounding King Obama during the signing of gun control materials disgusts me and is ‘repugnant’.

  19. I think the king and his jester should be turned in to D.C. Child Services for exploiting and abusing children.

  20. making the president’s children a subject of political policy is repugnant, while making the sandy hook victims a subject of political policy isn’t?

    of course!

    • And by “young” you mean under 40, of course. It’s a moving target, but 40 and under is where you find the folks who have spent a part of their day online for their entire adult lives.

      The problem is that it’s not cool to be an online-media consultancy for large orgs like the NRA or other quasi-governmental entities. What they really need to do is hire a couple of Silicon Valley tech leadership types (and many of us are shooters) and fund a real social-media operation inside the NRA.

      I mean, hell, President Obama’s technology team has been profiled so extensively that it’s practically a blueprint for how to do this stuff.

      • I don’t know if it was cowardly, but it was terrible. The point is to persuade people who have not made up their minds, not discourage them to associate with you.

        The NRA may know the which politician likes which scotch, but between this ad and Wayne’s public appearances the NRA has proven beyond all doubt that it is inept in the persuasion department. Hire some people who know what they are doing… I am 40 and I see all kinds of people my age and younger at the range, so don’t tell me that you can’t find anyone born after 1970 to help out.

        • Wayne was the young guy who brought the organization into the modern era…20 years ago.

          He is so good at preaching to the choir that he forgot how to talk to regular people.

          I thank you Wayne from the bottom my heart. Now please ride your legacy into the sunset.

    • + 1000 Ralph.

      Funny you add POS in front of POTUS; I used to think POTUS stould for Piece Of Totally Useless Sh!t. In regards to BHO of course (Bodily Horrendous Odor). 😉

  23. Why should we listen to some one who calls to protect children in the US but gleefully butchers them else were. Hes killed more children then all the mass shooters this year.

  24. “Most Americans agree that a president’s children should not be used as pawns in a political fight.”

    Fixed it for you, Barack. (Now you can go back to your previously scheduled dancing on the graves of the dead.)

    I’ve made the mistake of voting for politicians with D in front of their names in the past, but this is the last time any Democrat gets my vote for any national office. And no, I’m not voting for the Republitards, either. Call my vote wasted if you want, but I’m going third-party independent all the way. The corrupt two-party power structure is destroying this nation, and I refuse to contribute my vote to it.

    • Yeah, right there with you. I feel too strongly about social issues to ever vote GOP for national office, and in any case that would be a wasted vote considering where I live.

      Maybe the Libertarians can shake off the stench of mediocre candidates and the whiff of tax-dodging sketchiness in their platform for the next election cycle. That would be nice.

        • I hear you. One of my rhetorical “tells” is finishing a thought with “That would be nice.” If I write that, you can take it to the bank that I know it’s never gonna happen.

          That’s the problem with being a small-L libertarian in the US today, especially if you have any compassion at all for your fellow man. There’s just no easy answer on who best represents your interests.

          I thought I was doing OK by voting to re-elect an administration that was good on a bunch of stuff I cared about, and by their record during the first term appeared to be neutral on other entries on my hot-button list like 2A and the various expansions of exec power under GWB. Yeah, THAT worked out really well, but I’m not convinced that the alternative was any better.

        • “That’s the problem with being a small-L libertarian in the US today, especially if you have any compassion at all for your fellow man. There’s just no easy answer on who best represents your interests.”

          Yep, this is it in a nutshell.

          What to do, what to do… For now, I guess all I can do is become increasingly bitter and cling to my guns (the few that I’ve been able to afford so far).

      • the whiff of tax-dodging sketchiness

        Did you get that talking point from the White House, Tax-lover?

    • this is certainly the last straw for me. for too long i have given democrats the benefit of the doubt, somehow believing theyre a little bit better than republicans. ive been wrong before and im certainly wrong in this case.

      its nice to see my votes for libertarian candidates have been done without regret. im glad i did everything in my power to not play the game.

  25. Just saw the commercial and I must say bravo. the NRA really hit back on this. Short sweet and to the point. I like most Americans (im fairly sure) don’t care anything about Obamas kids, but im sure they reek of “were special” the liberals tend to give off. Obama uses kids to jerk tears and its ok, NRA makes a valid point (cloudy to some it may be) and immediately Obamas minions attack them. Somebody called Obama an “Elitist hypocrite” and I sure as hell agree.

  26. Barry had his ring of human shields around him while he was signing the orders. Nothing cowardly about that.

    And there was nothing cowardly about the NRA pointing out the double standards indulged in by the power players. Guns for their kids but not for ours.

  27. Whose the Coward and Hypocrite? I would also agree not use Obamas children as political pawns if he quit using the American children as political pawns to push is hair-brained, unconstitutional agenda.

  28. “The state must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the people. As long as the government is perceived as working for the benefit of the children, the people will happily endure almost any curtailment of liberty and almost any deprivation.”

    – Adolph Hitler, Mein Kampf

    “This is our first task as a society…keeping our children safe.” – Barack Obama

  30. Right after the president uses four children as pawns behind him at his speech to push his agenda; he and the “public” says his children shouldnt be used to push the nra’s agenda? HUH? The hypocrisy is making my head spin

  31. I wish the Obama daughters would see that NRA Ad, then ask him “Daddy, why are we better than other peoples’ children? Why do we have armed guards, but other American children have to be in danger of getting killed, like in the school in Connecticut?”

    Sounds like a script idea for a biting, satirical comedy sketch.

  32. I’m just waiting on a month long commision lead by Biden on the national debt???
    We looked at everything, and talked to everyone. Here are the 23 EO’s that will address this problem. Of course none will help and just spend more money???
    I hate whatever happened at Sandy Hook!
    I did not kill my Mother and steal her guns. I did not, or ever have shot someone. But I’m paying for this with a reduced pay check, and some stupid new regulations.
    I live within my budget and have no debt. My pay just got cut, and I will somehow deal with that.
    JMHO O&B are playing the American People. Focus on Guns a known trip wire. Get everyone talking about something other than money and debt.
    Guy22

  33. Oh yeah! I hope my son hangs out with their daughter so we can benefit from tax payer protection. I know the reason behind the protection but did you ever seem to notice that all the people who try to change the laws and are in power… Well they have armed security and live in gated communities. Omg they are so out of touch. I vote for moving all of congress to the south side of Chicago and pull the armed guards. Lets see how they like real life. Idiots.

  34. Ugh…I agree with the Governor to a degree. But the NRA was absolutely in line to point out this hypocrisy. Where I agree with the Governor is that the message was flawed. Instead of making the case that all children deserve protection (which was the intent of the flick) it really came across like the President’s kids SHOULDN’T have the protection they have if we can’t. We all know those girls do deserve protection. But we also know that our children are due protection as well. So although the intent was spot on, the actual message and tone missed the mark. The NRA needs to be a little more savvy with it’s PR and marketing. A softer touch would be nice. I really like what someone said about having a young person doing a voice over, women too.

    Obviously, many of us like deep and in your face attitude this video had. We know what it means, we get it. The people that we need to win over don’t respond to that rough texture. It plays right into image the anti’s are trying to paint of the NRA and it’s members. They want everyone to think Alex Jones and James “I-don’t-know-how-to-shut-my-effing-mouth” Yeager.

    /rant 🙂

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