Democratic Frontrunners Discover 2nd Amendment, Sort Of

In the days since the U. S. Supreme Court announced that it would hear arguments on the D. C. gun case, the two Democratic front runners have each discovered a renewed attachment to the amendment.

Barack Obama fired a shot yesterday, saying to The Des Moines Register

I respect the Second Amendment. I think lawful gun owners should be able to hunt, be sportsmen, protect their families.

Of course, being Obama, he went on to step on his own statement by bringing his wife's views into the discussion.

"And by the way, Michelle, my wife, she was traveling up, I think, in eastern Iowa, she was driving through this nice, beautiful area, going through all this farmland and hills and rivers and she said 'Boy, it's really pretty up here,' but she said, 'But you know, I can see why if I was living out here, I'd want a gun. Because, you know, 911 is going to take some time before somebody responds. You know what I mean? You know, it's like five miles between every house."

Apparently, Mr. and Mrs. Obama haven't spent much time in the country or they would know that it is the number of guns in the hands of ordinary people in rural areas that has helped make crime less rewarding than it is in, say, Chicago.

Senator Hillary Clinton, notwithstanding her lifelong disdain for guns not actually held by her own bodyguards, makes about the same point as Mrs. Obama by saying to same paper

I support the Second Amendment. Law-abiding citizens should be able to own guns.

She may have learned that line from her husband, who blamed the Democrat's loss in 1994 specifically at the feet of the National Rifle Association.

Of course, she had to dig the words out of the Clinton's "Is" basket, where they store difficult and dangerous words needing special parsing or definitions before public use, such as "is."