Hillary Clinton on Tuesday demanded that any strategy to fight terrorism at home and abroad must include making it harder for militants to buy guns and said she won’t “let the gun lobby or anyone else" get in her way if she is elected.
"If you are too dangerous to fly, you are too dangerous to buy a gun, period," Clinton said referring to legislation that has been held up by gun-loving Republicans that would make it more difficult for people on FBI's "no-fly list" to purchase firearms.
“And I am not going to let the gun lobby or anyone else tell me that is not the right road to go down,” she said to thunderous applause during the talk, coming just hours before a GOP presidential debate was scheduled to begin.
“The phrase active shooter should not be one we have to teach our children, but it is,” Clinton added, before repeating calls to reinstate an expired federal assault weapons ban.
The 2016 Democratic frontrunner — whose three-point plan to take on ISIS that includes conducting airstrikes in Syria and Iraq; dismantling finance and arms networks that aid militants; and foiling plots at home and taking steps to disrupt radicalization — focused Tuesday mainly on the last point. The former secretary of state repeatedly stressed the importance of “empowering our Muslim-American community who are on the front lines of the fight against radicalization,” outlining a multi-pronged plan to work together peacefully with local Muslims leaders in the U.S. to fight radical elements.
“When people see respect and trust, they are more likely to work together with law enforcement,” she said.
Clinton, however, appeared to spend the majority of her time speaking rejecting the “bigotry” and controversial proposals being offered by many of the Republican candidates running for President, singling out lines iterated by Donald Trump and Ted Cruz.
“We cannot give in to demagogues who take advantage of our basest instincts,” she said.
Our political debate has been anything but serious. We can't afford another major ground war in the Middle East,” she added. “Shallow slogans don't add up to a strategy.”
“Promising to ‘carpet bomb until the desert glows’ doesn’t make u sound strong, it makes you sound like you’re in over your head,” she said, referring to words used by Cruz last week. “Bluster and history are not credentials for becoming commander-in-chief,” she said, rejecting the numerous GOP proposals made to limit or altogether ban Muslims from entering the U.S. “It would be a cruel irony indeed if ISIS was able to force people from their homes and also prevent them from finding new ones,” she said.
“We cannot give in to fear. We cannot let it stop us from doing what is right and necessary to make us safe,” she said. “We cannot let fear push us into reckless actions that make us less safe. Americans are going to have to act with both courage and clarity.”
Clinton also touted the importance of cooperation between government officials and tech companies to help fight ISIS and other terrorist networks online. “We need a stronger relationships between Washington and Silicon Valley,” Clinton said. “American innovation is a powerful force and we need to put it to work.”
“We must work to deny (ISIS) virtual territory just as we work to deny them actual territory,” she added.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/hillary-clinton-slams-gop-isis-muslim-comments-article-1.2466971
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