I believe President Obama committed political suicide during last night’s debate where he called for reinstating an AWB:
“… what I’m trying to do is to get a broader conversation about how do we reduce the violence generally. Part of it is seeing if we can get an assault weapons ban reintroduced …”
He’s been real careful to avoid gun control over the last four years. Why he decided to say this now I don’t know. My only guess is with polls now showing Mitt Romney at 50% and his ’08 supporters abandoning him, he’s trying to shore up a disintegrating base.
Pretty much; at this point he’s probably thinking “What have I got to lose? The bitter clingers won’t vote for me anyway, and my base is eroding!”