As a country, we have been through this too many times, says Obama

The “easy availability of the deadliest weapons to the most dangerous people has cost countless lives and caused immeasurable suffering, never more so than today,” she said. Gun control advocates used Twitter to assemble a protest outside the White House to call for stricter gun laws.

By the appointed hour, about 100 people had gathered. Gun Control Alexandra Wilson (28) of Washington arrived on her bike 15 minutes early.

“The press secretary said this isnt the time to talk about it, but it’s the time to talk about it,” Wilson said.

“I know weve got plenty of other problems, the fiscal cliff and everything, but we can’t forget about this. Its happening too much.”

Earlier this week, three died after a gunman opened fire inside a mall in suburban Portland, Oregon. In August, a gunman took the lives of six people at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, before being killed by a police officer.

In July, a masked gunman opened fire at a midnight movie in Aurora, Colorado, killing 12 and injuring 58.

Campaign

In the wake of the summer’s shootings and in the midst of his election campaign, Mr Obama said he would “examine additional ways that we can reduce violence” even as he resisted calls for legislation to curb such tragedies. Mr Obama and his aides, during the campaign, said the president supported a “common sense” approach to gun control.

During a presidential debate in New York last October Mr Obama said that in a second term he would look into reinstating the assault weapon ban, something he supported during his 2008 campaign.

Prefacing his answer by saying he believes in the Second Amendment, Obama said he’s committed to enforcing existing laws, making sure they’re keeping guns out of the hands of mentally ill criminals and doing more to enforce background checks.

Still, he was noncommittal about making the issue a priority of his second term. “And so what I’m trying to do is to get a broader conversation about how do we reduce the violence generally,” Mr Obama said at the debate. “Part of it is seeing if we can get an assault weapons ban reintroduced, but part of it is also looking at other sources of the violence, because frankly, in my hometown of Chicago, theres an awful lot of violence, and they’re not using AK-47s, they’re using cheap handguns.”– (Bloomberg).