NRA ad deplorable, even for NRA's standards

Using the president's daughters, gun organization misleads the public

The gun debate seems to have brought out the worst in some people. While most Americans try to have sensible debates and rational discussions on the matter of guns, others have gone an entirely different direction.

Some have errantly called the actions of the president -- even before he made his announcement today calling for stricter gun regulations -- tyrannical.

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul even likened President Obama to acting like a king.

Obama’s actions are hardly monarchical -- indeed, the president has issued the lowest number of executive orders out of all the past presidents of the last one hundred years. None of his executive orders today imposes new policy, merely enforcing laws already passed. And he’s even recognized that his call for a new assault rifle ban requires passage through Congress.

But none of that seems to matter to the fringe right. It’s frightening that those opposed to his call for reasoned restrictions are going so far, with some calling for outright civil war if they are imposed. Nothing that Obama has done warrants such dialogue, much less any action of such magnitude.

Criticism of the president’s plan is one thing -- calling him a tyrant or advocating secession over his proposals is completely uncalled for.

Taking their own brand to even lower levels, the NRA is not lost from the list of the president’s critics who have crossed the line. Just a day after releasing a new shooting App video game (while previously claiming video games were the problem), the NRA has released an ad claiming the president is a hypocrite for being uneasy about guns in schools while his children are protected by armed guards.

That would be hypocritical -- were it not for the fact that the president’s life is constantly threatened. The president’s daughters warrant protection because Obama is receiving threats on a daily basis. Were your children receiving threats the likes of Obama’s family, it’s likely, too, that you’d receive some sort of police protection in your own community.

So the analogy that the NRA is trying to make is a far cry from reality. But that isn’t the real issue -- what’s really mind-boggling is how low the organization is prepared to go in order to score politically.

Using the president’s daughters in a deceptive ad like this is unprecedented. The NRA is acting shamefully, misleading the American public while taking the danger the president’s daughters face lightly.

For anyone to support such an organization, to endorse these opportunists who try to influence policy in such a disgusting way, truly boggles the mind.