Republicans slam Obama’s ‘rant’ on guns

Former Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.) said on Friday that Americans are tiring of President Obama’s calls for gun control in the wake of recent mass shootings.

“A good leader waits and takes in the facts bit by bit before making any proclamations,” West wrote in a post on his blog published that morning.

{mosads}“Sadly, President Obama could not restrain himself and went into his normal rant before all the facts were in,” he said of Thursday’s massacre at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Ore.

“This is not about new ‘gun safety’ laws,” West added. “Guns have a safety mechanism on them. And for responsible gun owners, there are gun safety courses that advance individual firearm confidence and proficiency.”

West then argued that Obama is wrong for politicizing incidents like the one a day earlier in Oregon that killed 10 students and wounded 7 more.

“It’s not that we’ve become numb to these shootings and incidents – we are numb to your cherry-picking and ideological bent on every issue,” he wrote of Obama.

“Mr. President, please no more speeches,” West said. “Maybe instead of rants about gun safety laws, we should assess how we eliminate gun free zones where human safety is placed at a disadvantage.”

Obama raged against Congressional gridlock on gun control during a tense press conference late Thursday.

“This is a political choice we make, to allow this to happen every few months in America,” he told reporters. “We collectively are answerable to those families who lose their loved ones because of our inaction.”

“Somehow this has become routine,” Obama added. “The reporting is routine, my response here at this podium ends up being routine. And what becomes routine is the response from those who oppose any sort of gun control legislation.”

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) then criticized the president’s understanding of firearms use Friday morning.

“I think the president has very little knowledge of what causes crime or how to reduce crime,” he said on Fox News.

“The reality is gun control laws control the behavior of legitimate people,” Giuliani said. “People who rob stores, people who rob banks and people who are insane and want to go ahead and murder people don’t follow the gun control laws.”

Chris Harper Mercer, 26, allegedly opened fire on UCC students Thursday afternoon after asking which religion they practiced.

Mercer then reportedly died after exchanging fire with responding law enforcement officials during the incident.

Multiple outlets have since profiled the accused shooter as an isolated, anti-social man with a troubled family background and admiration for the Irish Republican Army.