FoxNews.com
1/16/2013
The following is a list, provided by the White House, of executive actions President Obama plans to take to address gun violence.
1. Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal agencies to make relevant data available to the federal background check system.
2. Address unnecessary legal barriers, particularly relating to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, that may prevent states from making information available to the background check system.
3. Improve incentives for states to share information with the background check system.
4. Direct the Attorney General to review categories of individuals prohibited from having a gun to make sure dangerous people are not slipping through the cracks.
5. Propose rulemaking to give law enforcement the ability to run a full background check on an individual before returning a seized gun.
6. Publish a letter from ATF to federally licensed gun dealers providing guidance on how to run background checks for private sellers.
7. Launch a national safe and responsible gun ownership campaign.
8. Review safety standards for gun locks and gun safes (Consumer Product Safety Commission).
9. Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal law enforcement to trace guns recovered in criminal investigations.
10. Release a DOJ report analyzing information on lost and stolen guns and make it widely available to law enforcement.
11. Nominate an ATF director.
12. Provide law enforcement, first responders, and school officials with proper training for active shooter situations.
13. Maximize enforcement efforts to prevent gun violence and prosecute gun crime.
14. Issue a Presidential Memorandum directing the Centers for Disease Control to research the causes and prevention of gun violence.
15. Direct the Attorney General to issue a report on the availability and most effective use of new gun safety technologies and challenge the private sector to develop innovative technologies.
16. Clarify that the Affordable Care Act does not prohibit doctors asking their patients about guns in their homes. [emphasis CAJ]
17. Release a letter to health care providers clarifying that no federal law prohibits them from reporting threats of violence to law enforcement authorities.
18. Provide incentives for schools to hire school resource officers.
19. Develop model emergency response plans for schools, houses of worship and institutions of higher education.
20. Release a letter to state health officials clarifying the scope of mental health services that Medicaid plans must cover.
21. Finalize regulations clarifying essential health benefits and parity requirements within ACA exchanges.
22. Commit to finalizing mental health parity regulations.
23. Launch a national dialogue led by Secretaries Sebelius and Duncan on mental health.
Also at the site, State officials vow to fight back against new gun laws
NY approves sweeping gun control package, owners worry about new rules
Related: Limbaugh: Obama Uses Kids As Human Shields
Obama makes your doctor a spy for the federal government
…Doctors will be told that there is no legal barrier to their reporting on their patients to the federal government on the issue of guns. The executive orders also inform doctors that they are not prohibited by law from asking their patients if they are gun owners.
Thus, the inherent, traditional privacy that has characterized the doctor-patient relationship is now gone, unless Congress rescinds the executive orders in question. Obama stated in one of the executive orders that his new Obamacare law contains no requirement of privacy and supersedes the healthcare portability act of 1998 in which Congress strengthened the privacy of healthcare patients. Obamacare wiped out all legal protections of privacy.
Will patients now be able to trust their own doctor? It is highly unlikely unless doctors refuse to comply.
Some doctors are already protesting the executive orders, stating that they fear patients will drop out of the healthcare system altogether once they realize that the system is designed to use doctors as government informants…
Read the whole thing.
Update: From The People’s Cube:
There’s more at the link.
Law Expert Freedman: Obama’s Gun Move Raises Constitutional Concerns
…“There’s another concern here, which is federalism. The issues that we’re dealing with today — gun violence, crimes, school safety — are all very important, but under the Constitution, these are really issues for the state governments to deal with. And I’m very concerned that there seems to be an increasing acceptance that the federal government should take the lead on these issues.”
Obama announced 23 executive orders he is issuing on gun control, circumventing Congress, and Freedman says “I am concerned about separation of powers here because this is a president who likes to push the envelope when it comes to using executive orders…
Meese: Obama Risks Impeachment on Orders
Update 2: Understanding PTSD
Update 3: Obama: Doctors Should Push Gun Control With Their Patients
