According to a blog published by the New York Times, Hillary Clinton has told Iowa voters, “I believe in the Second Amendment, and I don’t see any contradiction between the Second Amendment and laws that keep guns out of the hands of criminals.†The irony in this statement is that her husband did a great service to the Republican takeover in 1994 by relentlessly pushing his symbolic “assault weapons ban.” According to Stanford political scientist Morris Fiorina, it probably cost the Democrats at least six seats in the House (including Speaker Tom Foley from Eastern Washington and Jack Brooks, the long-time Texan head of the House Judiciary Committee) . . . So I take Sen. Clinton’s declaration of support for the Second Amendment–the next question, of course, is what precisely she “believes” the Second Amendment means in 2007–is the best evidence possible for the new-found respect it gathers, at least rhetorically, across the political spectrum.
Indeed. I can’t say I’m surprised by Hillary’s reaction. Or Obama’s.