Maybe Nanny Bloomberg Isn’t So Bad After All

NOLA Defender notes that Bloomberg’s recent George Soros-style, bull-in-a-china-shop throwing of money around in an effort to infringe on the 2nd Amendment rights of Americans who lack the budget for bodyguards could well create some collateral damage here in Louisiana. It seems the New York mayor and media billionaire is launching a multi-million dollar ad campaign in support of the impracticable and stupid idea to require universal background checks in advance of every transaction involving guns, and one of the targets is a certain politician whose stance on the 2nd Amendment she’d prefer not to advertise…

Comprehensive background checks are a key piece of President Barack Obama’s gun reform plan. They would close the “gun show loophole,” requiring checks on sales made by private gun sellers. Mayor Mike’s Mayors Against Illegal Guns coalition says about 40 percent of gun sales are made by the private sellers. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid put the wheels in motion on a gun bill with “expanded” background checks, but conservative Rand Paul is indicating that he will fillibuster the effort.

Though Landrieu’s brother Mayor Mitch is a member of the coalition, Mary Landrieu faces a tough reelection campaign coming up next year in a state that just passed a constitutional amendment that’s proudly held up as the most extensive Second Amendment protection in the country.

It gets even more entertaining, as one of Landrieu’s more famous backers has stepped up to complain about the Big Gulp Avenger’s meddling on Louisiana’s electoral scene…

What with the family dynamics and all, Bloomberg’s strategy may seem a bit impolite, especially for a mayor from up North. But the cable news mavens knew exactly where to turn this morning for an explanation. Newly liberated from CNN, James Carville was free to head over with his forward-leaning brethren on MSNBC and discuss Bloomberg’s campaign on this morning’s edition of The Daily Rundown.

The Ragin’ Cajun was quick to point out that universal background checks enjoy much wider public popularity than other pieces of gun reform that have already been ruled out, such as a ban on assault weapons.

“First of all, in terms framing what they want, expanded background checks, that’s 85, 90 percent of the people agree with that, be they gun owners or people from Louisiana, or people from Massachusetts or people from anywhere else,” Carville told The Daily Rundown’s Luke Russert. “The problem is it’s never framed like that. You saw Karl Rove on Sunday morning TV saying, ‘Oh no. You’re not going to be able to give a gun to your grandchild, etc, etc.’ The [National Rifle Association] is saying the same thing. So, Mayor Bloomberg is doing this, and I think–you need to frame the issue properly.”

And a little more…

“If Mary Landrieu votes, the NRA is going to send a letter out, they’re not going to say she voted for expanded background checks, or [keeping out of hands of] felons, or people with mental illness can’t get a gun, they’re going to say that she’s trying to take everyone’s gun away,” Carville told MSNBC. “So, they never frame the issue properly. So, this thing is going to go the way gay marriage does, as people have a chance to look at it more and more, this thing is going to change.”

Of course, the majority of gun transfers which occur outside of the current background-check universe…are gifts and inheritances among family and friends. Those polls Carville talks about aren’t prefaced with that information; the guess here is that if the issue is framed even more “improperly” in Carville’s parlance to ask people where they come down on the federal government requiring a father to put his son through a federal background check before giving him a .38 that has been in the family for 50 years, nobody on the Left is going to like the result.

The guess here is also that damn few people in Louisiana will take kindly to Michael Bloomberg filling up the airwaves with ads demanding that Mary Landrieu vote with the gun-grabbing crowd, regardless of what the actual bill is. Bloomberg is about as popular as chlamydia in Louisiana, though nobody has bothered to poll him here to prove it.

Carville knows this. And he knows this could be one more issue on which Mary Landrieu is making votes which will do damage to her 2014 re-election campaign. Which is why his MSNBC appearance essentially came down to this…

The question is whether Bloomberg will listen. That’s not typically a strength of his – which is something Carville, and the rest of Mary Landrieu’s camp, can’t be too excited about.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Interested in more national news? We've got you covered! See More National News
Previous Article
Next Article

Trending on The Hayride