Sheriff Joe Biden, the head of President Obama’s task force on guns, told a panel of victims’ groups from Newtown and gun-control advocates today, “The president and I are determined to take action,” and even mentioned the possibility of decisive measures from up top. “Executive order, executive action that can be taken, we haven’t decided what that is yet,” said Biden, sending Matt Drudge to his old file of Hitler JPEGs. “But we’re compiling it all with the help of the attorney general and all the rest of the cabinet members as well as legislative action, we believe, is required.”
Biden’s group is prepping a “comprehensive” plan in the wake of the killings at Sandy Hook Elementary School that might even be ready early. “We had been led to believe their report would come by end of January, but we’re hearing they may want to have something out by January 15, even quicker than expected,” the director of Michael Bloomberg’s Mayors Against Illegal Guns told Talking Points Memo.
“Every once in a while there’s something that awakens the conscience of the country, and that tragic event did in a way like nothing I’ve seen in my career,” said the vice-president. Tomorrow he will meet with representatives for the NRA and gun superstore Wal-Mart, a less sympathetic audience that may require a bit more of that Biden charm.
