After Sikh temple shooting, Obama calls for "soul searching," ways to reduce violence
President Barack Obama answers a reporter's question after signing the Honoring America's Veterans and Caring for Camp Lejeune Families Act of 2012 in the Oval Office at the White House August 6, 2012 in Washington, DC.
/ Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images(CBS News) The shooting at a suburban Milwaukee Sikh temple on Sunday should spur leaders to pause and consider what they can do to prevent such tragedies, President Obama said Monday.
"I think all of us recognize that these kinds of terrible events are happening with too much regularity for us not to do some soul searching and examine additional ways we can reduce violence," Mr. Obama said following a bill signing in the Oval Office.
Six people were killed in the shooting on Sunday and three were injured before police shot and killed the gunman. The tragic incident came less than three weeks after a mass shooting in Aurora, Colorado.
The president said he and other officials are awaiting the outcome of the full investigation into the Sikh temple shooting. It's not yet clear what motivated the shooter, but Mr. Obama said that if he were motivated in any way by the ethnicity of those attending the temple, the American people would "immediately recoil at those kinds of attitudes."
Shooter kills 6, at Wis. Sikh temple
Worst fear for American Sikhs realized
Obama, Romney express condolences on temple shooting
"I think it will be very important for us to reaffirm once again that in this country, regardless of what we look like, where we come from, who we worship, we are all one people and we look after one another and we respect one another," he said.
After the Aurora, Colo., shooting last month, some elected officials around the country as well as members of Congress renewed calls for new gun control measures, but Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi on Sunday told the Huffington Post that such measures had little chance of passing any time soon.
"The votes aren't there for gun control," she said. "We certainly aren't going to be able to do it in this Congress, and I don't know that we would be able to do it in a Democratic Congress because it takes a lot of votes to go down that path."
Popular in Politics
- FBI director acknowledges domestic drone use 146 Comments
- Obama and Berlin: Faded echoes meet new realities
- Smooth, on-time Obamacare rollout no sure thing: GAO
- Obama on NSA programs: Americans "not getting the complete story" 260 Comments
- House Republicans pass 20-week limit on abortions 503 Comments
- Immigration reform would cut deficit, analysis shows
- GOP Sen. Murkowski backs same-sex marriage
- Obama renews push for a nuclear disarmament legacy
True Americans do not want to hear this BS or be subjected to "commands" from Obama pertaining to the above.
Every time OBAMA takes one of these steps; he causes another militia to form to stop him from taking complete control of our lives amd destroying the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
Americans were happy with the ideals and values represented by these two documents.
While I certainly would never shoot or blow up a Muslim; I really resent this BS being shoved down my throat.
By the same token, I can somewhat understand these over-reactions
by the shooters who I think are reacting out of fear and anger.
Obama should search his own soul and take into consideration just how much resentment and anger he is creating in loyal Americans.
Obama has abused his power in many areas of American values and ideals; sneaking in individuals to oversee government agencies while Congress is in recess and using Executive Privilege to ram through things he wants when Congress and the Senate won't give him what he wants.
If Obama is re-elected; his already over-inflated ego will only encourage him to continue to destroy the US as we knew it.
If Romney is elected; disabled and older Americans stand to lose the programs they paid into from the first day they started working (Social Security and Medicare)by a bunch of politicians who raided this trust fund and squandered this money.
Had they not done so; there would be $220 TRILLION dolars in this fund; more than enough to pay to the elderly and retired people almost into infinity.
"We the People" need to stand up to these bloodsuckers and start demanding that the US start taking care of their own for a change.!!!
Too bad he an Eric Holder didn't do any soul searching for the hundreds being killed in Mexico and our Border Agent murdered with illegal guns they sold to the Mexican drug cartels in their criminal Fast and Furious scheme.
So how could Obama care for just 7 killed in this shooting or the 12 in the theatre killings in Colorado?
That,s a drop in the bucket.
Phony campaign soul searching.
I guess you were in a coma for the past 3 1/2 years but Bush isn't president and your spam is fiticious since the US Military does not use AK-47s but M-16s and guns are always misplaced durng times of war. During WWII and Vietnam the same thing happened.
Try again
Now, I see all of the Democrats here also practicing their anti-religious bigotry.
Birds of a feather.
Except we're all Democrats now.
Even you...
Sorry to employ obfuscation, but I'm sure you'll figure it out...
That way people can pack whatever heat they want, and still be held accountable when, in a room full of gun-toters, someone decides to shoot.
Hey, Colorado has conceal and carry laws - was nobody in that theater packing a rod that day?
Assuming people have souls.
Obama does, but that's assuming he's been compromising with the soulless to show how bad they have been and still are (the GOP).
But one has to start somewhere, and some of us out here in peanutgalleryland have been doing so longer than he has suggested we do so.