In chicago yesterday president obama talked about his gun control proposal. Do you think congress should consider a proposal and vote . Be prepared to tell us why or why not. Here are the numbers. 2025853881 for republicans. 2025853880 for democrats. You can always send us email. The Chicago Tribune picked up the story, talking about a wide range of issues. Gun violence is the main topic of the speech. The reporter says part of the speeches today look to congress and what they should do. Here is what he had to say. Gu[video clip] ivory i recognize not everybody has to agree with our issues. Different from upstate and downstate illinois. These proposals deserve a vote in congress. They deserve a vote. [applause] and i want to thank those members of congress who are working together in a serious way to try to address this issue. Host playing off of that repeated phrase, that is the question we propose to you, whether you think they deserve a vote. Whether you do or dont, you could call on the lines that represent you. We have put this on twitter as well. Facebook 2. We had about 20 responses when we first started the program. Here are a couple of them to get your sense of what is going on. Christopher says they do deserve a vote. Duane clem as this, what about the over 30 budget bills that the house has passed . We are asking you if they deserve a vote or not. We want to get your opinions. The numbers will stay on the screen. They all start with 8202 area code. With a 202 area code. You can reach out to us on a variety of social media. A Twitter Response gun control deserves an up or down vote. National journal did a side by side story looking at violence in chicago. They say that president obama traveled back to chicago and a city on track to become of the murder capital of the United States again that is the national journal. This shows the line graph from january 12 january 2012 if go by the fbis estimates at a time approaching two hundred 50. That is followed by new york, baltimore, and philadelphia. Detroit and los angeles being charted there as well. Your thoughts for the next 40 minutes. Mark on the democrats line, what do you think . Caller i agree with the Second Amendment that we all have the right to bear arms. When it comes to these assault weapons, there are too many shootings with the schools. It has become almost an every day thing. It is creating a panic. I know certain areas are worse than others. The government has a compelling interest to address this. They need to try to put rules on the table, not to take away the Second Amendment, but to enforce more rules to negate these happenings. Host the president several times reiterating that the proposal deserves a vote. What he think . Caller i agree. Congress is our lawmakers. They put things in place and have to have a vote on this. I agree it should come to that. I believe in the Second Amendment. We have to make concessions here. Host do you think that congress will take up the votes and what the president is proposing . What do you ultimately think will, of that . Caller i think it will come to a decision. It has become very imperative to do something about it. At this time i think they are going to come to a fair decision across the board, how to address this and put rules in place that we have to negate thkis from happening. Host jim from twitter says this vote on it and move it down, and then move onto something important. We go to ralph on the democrat line. Caller i agree with the automatic weapons. People do not need automatic weapons to hunt with. I think we should take them off of the streets. Host talk about congresss role, then tweet whether a vote should be taken on these proposals and why or why not. Caller i think they should take a vote on it. As far as voting, they should vote against the automatic weapons. They should vote to cut down on crime, as well as getting the automatic weapons off of the street. As far as fighting the crime and automatic weapons, why doesnt the president use those troops from afghanistan to fight crime . The best way to do that is take the gangs off the street and get the weapons back from the gangs. Host that is ralph from mansfield, ohio. You can choose a line that best represents you on the president calling for his proposal yesterday looking at them and asking Congress Several times to take a vote on that. Choose the number that best represents you on the screen. You can also send us comments on twitter and facebook. Joseph adding that, i thought the Second Amendment to the constitution was already ratified by the nation . Give us a call or put a thought on facebook. Staten island new york, republican line, dennis, co head. Caller as far as the vote, i think it should come up for a vote. I am kind ambiguous about this. The Second Amendment says the right to bear arms really it says the right to bear arms, and the government is not to interfere with it. The Founding Fathers put that into the constitution for just in case we get a president who becomes a tyrant. No matter how farfetched you may think that is. Host as far as what congress should do about president s proposals, what would you think caller they should do i do not mind them taking a vote. Host on what specifically . Caller on gun control. Host peter joins us from tucson, arizona. Caller i think they should vote it down. All those places you showed with gun violence, they all have gun control laws. The guncontrol laws are not the ways to do it. It is the gangs and a legal people with the guns that are creating the problems. What are we going to do with the local citizens that have a semi automatic handgun with a 13 round magazine . Are they going to confiscate the magazines . The guy in ohio was talking about automatic weapons, automatic weapons have been illegal since the 1930s. Assault weapons and pistol grips, host the house said the proposals included extended background checks and bans on certain semiautomatic weapons and high capacity clips. That was some of the things he advocated for yet today when he told an audience in chicago that his proposals deserve a vote. We are asking you about that vote. Columbus, georgia, republican line. Caller 1 of your callers said automatic weapons should be illegal. Automatic weapons are illegal. President obama is using troops coming back from afghanistan to enforce laws. He could use a drone if he declared them enemies of the state. The amendment itself enforcing. Shall not be infringed. It shouldnt even be a vote. President obama is not preserving or protecting the constitution. I am actually an officer in the military. My job is to support and defend the constitution. If he keeps going the way he is going he is going to destroy this country more than he already has. It can get much worse. Host you seem nonchalant about the voting on it considering what he said before. Why is that . Caller what president obama is doing is destroying the country. It is quite likely this would be one of the things that americans would raise up in the way we can even imagine. The benghazi disaster, the Second Amendment was made to stop things like this. Host democrats line, but morning. Good morning. Caller i think the shooting in newtown means it deserves a vote. The congress voted 3 times to repeal the health care law. This is something that would help americans. They need to take time and give a vote to the people the second ammendment is not in danger. No one needs a 30round magazine. Universal checks is nothing, but it helps. Host a vote should take place, that is what you are saying. Caller exactly. Host what do you think of the prospect of the house or Senate Taking up these kinds of votes . Caller i think they would they should. If they are worrying about re elected they should be getting out anyway. President obama is just one person. He cannot make the law. Congress, the senate, they need to get to work. Host this is all of twitter the proposal includes bans on semiautomatic weapons and it also includes bans on high capacity clips. The president spoke on new town, with our caller brought up. He talked about it yesterday. He also talked about chicago and its gun violence. Here is what he had to say. [video clip] two months ago america mourned 26 innocent first graders and their educators in new town. Today i had the high honor of giving the highest civilian award i can give to the families of the educators who had been killed in newtown. There was something profound and uniquely heartbreaking and tragic about a group of 6year olds being killed. Last year there were 443 murders in the streets of the district. 65 of those victims were 18 and under. That is the equivalent of a newtown every 4 months. Host might on our question about the proposals, he says let us have a separate up and down vote on assault weapons ban and background checks. If you purchase a gun, you should register at. Independent line, minnesota. Good morning. Caller i do not think this vote is needed. I think we need to fix other things in this country. The Second Amendment handles this. Any law that should be put on the books the citizens of this country that follow the. Aws arent a problem i think we are spinning our wheels. I would like to see attention on the economy. We are failing hugely there. Host allison, west virginia, brian is on the line. Caller i think it is time people take responsibility. The gun is harmless while it sits in your cabinet. When you push people, you get an unstable amount of people out here. They need to be held accountable. It is not the guns problem. That is our Second Amendment right. It should not be up to any body in politics to take away something that was given to us. Host what are your thoughts on the votes on the specific measures . Caller take care of the criminals. Investigate these people that are unstable. Why should the politicians vote let us vote in. Let us vote on it and see where its lace. Host that is just one of the ways to contribute to the conversation. Also from the lead story in, the Chicago Tribune. And ex aldermen in chicago committed tax fraud the Washington Post, has a story on its front page. Saying new jersey, democrats line, talking about president s gun proposal and if they deserve a vote in congress. Caller absolutely they deserve it. Unfortunately there are a lot of people out there who should not have a license to use a gun. There are some people who use it for hunting and sport. That is one thing. I think a universal background check, not just when they purchased the gun, i am in the health profession. In order for us to keep our license we have to get a background check every two years. We redo our license and see if we have any attack of Mental Illness or assault charges. That is important to do. You may get that license and three months later you are getting charges for something. They will not take the gun away. They just blow that off. I am saying in general they need to crack down on this stuff. There are weapons that people do use that are home made. They cannot find them. I do not like violence, i think people who hurt people need a lot of help. As for throwing them in jail, some people learn from it and some people do not. The ones that do not are the ones you have to watch. Host from the baltimore sun, tom from alabama, thank you for holding on. You are on our republican line. Caller first i would like to say that i am also a an officer in the military. The vote should be rectifying the constitution. As it stands it is quite clear that federal government does not have the power to make these changes. Any vote would be unconstitutional. There is a ratification process that exists. Congress should feel free to use it if they feel the need to restrict firearms. Others may have mentioned that in no way were the founders ever concerned with they were concerned with their ability to resist. Semiautomatic weapons that congress are thinking about weapon are thinking about banning, these are the exact weapons. Host that was tom in alabama. This is jon in manassas, virginia on our independent line. Good morning. Caller i just wanted to bring up that in mexico guns are banned. Guns are banned in chicago and new york, also. This problem is not is that we are not enforcing the laws as we have as we should have. This is all just a thought. We have close to 23,000 gun laws on the books right now. We just need to enforce them, give the police the power and strength to go after criminals and keep them in jail. If you ban all of the guns, the criminals are still going to guess at the guns. They are going to make homemade weapons. That is ridiculous. We really need to enforce our law. The Second Amendment was about protection from tyranny, not about hunting. Host a lot of stories deal with the asteroid over russia. This is the announcement of a hearing taking a look at asteroids. It is from the house science, space and technology committee. According to chairman of lamar smith this morning a smaller meteorite hit a russian city injuring hundreds. It will invest in a future hearing in the house of representatives. Democrats line. Caller i just want to say that many conservatives have been saying for the last couple of years that they are against spending. We have to cut back spending. All of a sudden they say we should put an armed guard in every school, turning them into fortresses. If you look at how many schools there are, there are a hundred thousand fund 100,000 public schools. That includes just high schools, middle schools, and Elementary Schools. I will let you do the math on how much it will cost to turn every school into a fortress. Against spending. At the drop of a hat they are ready to spend all of the money to turn schools into fortresses and they want to handguns to teachers or janitors or bring our guards into schools. It is just ridiculous. Host president obama was in chicago yesterday. He said several times that the proposals deserve a vote. We are asking on we are asking your opinion. If you want to comment on the phone, the numbers a couple of stores in the Washington Post this morning, talking about health care the program was a temporary bridge for the uninsured, but it was supposed to last until 2014. On the front page, many Young Healthy americans could see a jump in their Health Insurance costs back to our discussion about the present cost done proposals. North carolina, independent line, danny. Thank you for waiting. Caller i have a little rifle. If i use it for target practice, it is a target rifle. If i used to procure feud, it is a hunting rifle. Is it called an assault . That is the only definition of that term. I do not understand how they called the smart and rifles assault weapons. Call these modern rifles assault weapons. Host certain types of automatic weapons, background checks, magazine clips, what do you think about that . Caller obama never did mention the lady from texas whose mom and dad was killed in the restaurant. He did not even mention her. I am sorry for that. She had a weapon, it was in the car. The restaurant would not allow her to bring that into the restaurant. Off nobody knew it was there but her. She could have protected people in that restaurant she could have saved many lives. Host from twitter a photo in the paper this morning, this was released over concerns of his health. The accompanying story says that despite the photos, the number of reoccurrence his answer trees that chavez has had to endured increasingly suggests he will not be able to make a full cup a move for recovery. Republican line. Caller i am against the boat. We have the Second Amendment. What are we supposed to do if somebody when the economy collapses and we have 30 people that will break into my home or somebody elses home. Is obama going to have his secret service with semi automatics . Host can i ask you why did it said an amendment would be covered by these proposals and a new administration . Caller we have a tyrannical government. What are we supposed to do if they are going to come after us. They are coming after to kill thehose of use that are sick or elderly. They want to euthanize us later in life. Or we can save money in medical. Just look at the way they are going. China owns us. Host and that relates to gun policy how . Caller we have to be able to protect ourselves. How are we supposed to go out and protect ourselves if we are not able to use the guns and we have chinese coming at us with their weapons host this is susan from texas on the democrats line. Caller the guy that called in about the amendment a well regulated militia necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. But the history is that we did not have a Standing Army before the revelation nor for many years thereafter. The army was dependent on individuals having guns and coming out in times of need to fight the british, not our own government. I am a gun owner. I believe in gun ownership. But the signers of the constitution had no concept of what would later be invented. It is just insanity, the things that are being said about this. Lies are being put into peoples mouths. The russians are going to come into a desk, we need to protect ourselves with a semiautomatic rifle . Yap, right. Host birmingham, gina, hello. Caller firsttime caller. I want everyone to give a hug to our president and support him. If we all support and rally together, maybe things will be better off than tearing things apart. Host we are talking about policies on guncontrol. He is saying they deserve a vote. Do you think they deserve a vote . Caller we all need to have a vote. Everybody has a chance and the free will and choice. Do not ask and do not tell. I am sure obama has tightened up guns and shot himself and shop and himself. It is nobodys business. Keep things more secretive. We have to take care of ourselves. Host this is from twitter monday is president s day. We are going to launch a new series taking a look at the first ladies of the white house. We called the it isfirst ladys influence and image, and it examines the lives of the first ladies, specifically their years in the white house. Each episode of the series lasts about 90 minutes. We will talk to historians, we look at some of the places they lived. That series kicks off on monday. If you want to find out more, use of the website just a second ago. Go to our website at cspan. Org. And join us monday at 9 00 p. M. For the launch. From pen