were first to set foot on the moon in 1969. no one has set foot on the lunar is surface since 1972. head over to aljazeera.com for the latest news. ray suarez is up next with "inside story." have a great night and great weekend. br weekend a few days after he laid out a new set of policies on guns, pps virginia to talk to americans about his proposals and about his legal approach to keeping gups out of the hands of the wrong people. no drama obama talked about the annual firearms death toll. the push back he got remind him how hard it is at this moment to propose anything that changes the way we buy and use guns? the president and the people,

it's the inside story welcome i'm ray suarez and this is "inside story". the president noted he has been on the job for seven years. so no american should have been surprised by the barack obama we saw last night. soft spoken, lawyerly, careful, the president laid out his rationale for tightening the background checks gup buyers must undergo. he told the gun ownerss in the audience they most likely went to background checks, and historically the rifle checks. >> historically many in the republican party were in favor of background checks and what has changed is not that my

proposals are particularly radical. what has changed is we've suddenly created an atmosphere in which i put out a proposal like background checks or after sandy hook calling on congress along with other people who were a victim of gun violence, we put out a proposal that is common sense, modest, does not claim to solve every problem, is respectful of the second amendment and the way it is described is that we're trying to take away everyone's guns the president would return again and again through the evening to the idea that he was not trying to take away the firearms of lawful gun owners, but from the reception he got that concern was very much on people's minds. one widow is the of chris kyle who was the basis of american sniper >> when you talk about after a

mass shooting that sales go up, i don't think it is necessarily that someone is going to take my gun from me, but i want the hope that i have the right to protect myself, that i don't end up to be one of these families, that i have the freedom to carry whatever represent i feel like i need. the sheriff is not going to get to my house. i understand that background is not going to stop me from getting a gun, but also not any of the people in this room from killing she was raped while a college student in 2006. a woman says she sees armed as a responsibility. a right the president was looking for ways to take awachlt as a survivor of rape and now a mother to two small children, it seems like being able to purchase a firearm of my choosing and being able to carry that where me and fight family are, it seems my basic responsibility as a parent at this point. i have been unspeakably victim identified once already--

victimized already and i refuse to let that happen again to myself or my kids. these restrictions that you're putting to make it harder for me to own a gun or take that where i need to be is actually making my kids and i less safe as he did earlier this week, the president stressed what the data says about gun deaths and answered the charge that his executive actions will do little to stop the most know tore i don't yous-- crimes >> crimes are always going to be with us, so i think it is important not to suggest that if we can't involve every crime, we shouldn't try to solve any crimes the president did have supporters in the room like former congress woman who marked five years since she was shot at a shopping center and her husband mark kelly. another, the mother of one a chicago high schooler killed

just weeks after she performed at the second obama inaugural. >> i want to say thank you to make it more difficult for guns to get into the wrong hands. how can we stop the guns with laws. i believe often in chicago and possibly the source of gun that murdered my daughter joining to cap off the week, the president of the national urban league, another, president of the american constitution society and a managing attorney at arsenal attorneys, a law practice specialistising in gun-related litigation. did we see on display last night in the questions and the answers the splits in the way americans

look at guns as both vital and dangerous? >> there is no question that the debate in the town hall demonstrated the deep divisions in america about guns and about the right to bear arms in their role in public safety, but sometimes the discussion misses essential and important facts. what the president is seeking to do is simply fulfil his responsibility to union formally - union formally enforce the brady law and the requirement of those that have to have a background check before they own a begun the president said several times times that he respected the second amendment, he understood what it said, he even referred to the proposals being not radical.

did he win anybody over, did he win you over? >> he did dmot win me over. i think that the - not win me over. i think if he knew he had a strong case he wouldn't push action. i am left feeling cynical and jaded. i think this has been used as a wedge issue politically in the campaign season, especially when the president mentioned a speech in the white house earlier that he conceded much of his possessings recommendations would not have stopped these high-profile tragedies that really have given rise to the debate in the first place that's only a tiny number. >> i want to say this. it is not just about the high-profile tragedies. it's about the 52,000 incidents of gun violence which took place in 2015.

it's the 13,000, if you will, victims, it's the 20,000 - the families of those who died from suicide. it's not just about the high-profile incidents. the day-to-day reality is that gun violence is taking too many lives. the important thing for victims and the families of victims, and those who it has touched, is if the president's actions save a life, if the president's actions would stop one incident, if the president's actions would make any community just a little bit more safe, then strengthening what we do in this area is a good thing. let's get this out of this washington wedge political conversation and let's bring it down to the neighborhoods of america's urban communities, small towns and rural areas the president conceded that these changes were marginal, that they would only make

changes at the margins, keep a couple of guns out of small number of people's hands who shouldn't have had them. do you agree with the mayor that it's worth doing if it is at the margins or that there has got to be a cost benefit analysis here? >> i absolutely do because i think all of us would say if that life was mine, or someone i loved, absolutely i want that life saved. what i think is important to sort of put out there is to understand that the gun lobby both wants to say this is minimal and unimportant and wouldn't have prevented this and that and the other thing from happening. on the other hand, the sky is falling. this is terrible, it is unconstitutional and the president is over reaching his authority. i think we need to get to tv a rational, common sense conversation about how do we deal with gun violence in this country. if we have to start with smaller steps which as the mayor had said are very clearly about the president executing the laws

that have already been passed by congress, ensuring that dangerous people cannot have access to guns, that's going to help somebody. it might not help everybody, but let's start somewhere we're looking back at the president's town hall meeting and ahead to the terms, the boundaries of the future of the debate over guns in this country. the president and the people. stay with it. it's inside story. >> welcome to al jazeera america. more reporters, more stories, more perspective. >> from our award-winning news teams across america and beyond. >> we've got global news covered.

>> we're here to fully get into

the nuances of everything that's going on, not just in this country, but around the world. getting the news from the people who are affected. >> people need to demand reform... >> ali velshi on target. you're watching inside story. the president and the people and guns this time on the program. last night the president explained his executive actions regarding brown checks and other gun-related policies to a sometimes skeptical audience. he deplored the gun law. he said for gun owners and gun buyers little will change. he said the polarisation over the issues and what he called the conspiracy theories that portray every measure he has taken as the first step in a larger secret plan to seize privately held guns. take a listen

>> i'm only going to be here for another year. i don't know - when would i have started on this enterprise? right? we're talking to the president of the national urban league and the american constitution society and arsenal attorneys. father michael flager suggested titles for guns, like other items that we transfer, cars. that could lead to a gun registry which would mean the government would know where every gun is. yooich been shaped by the way of slippery slope thinking has modified this debate. did the president make a fair point last night? >> it's rich. it was a rich point. that was the most emotional point of the debate because this is a president who got re-elected, fabricate of the false narrative on contraception and there was a conspiracy or war on women.

now he accuses people who he said follow the old american tradition of fearing some distant power or authority. it's really rich. one uses that rhetoric, it is very demeaning. i don't think he ever is comfortable speaking about liberty or rights. he speaks about liberty and it is hard for him to say the government should control your health care. we never hear about the one life saved due to self-defence. that portion of the discussion i infuriating. >> i don't want to get into a discussion about contraception, but we could go there too and i could mention the hobby case in the sfreem court and everything that has come out of that, but-- supreme court, but i think the president has put some things out that are so very common sense or simply doing what he needs to do to make sure that the law is enforced. we have these laws, congress has already passed that say that dangerous people should not get people.

i don't think dangerous people should have guns and i think the vast majority of americans think the same. having the president makes sure those laws are enforced more fully and completely, go for it who do you decide what is dangerous is at issue >> that is part of the law. it is a big enforcement piece you were trying to get in? >> i think one of the things that ask important is that those that may oppose the president's action talk about the second amendment. there is the first amendment. the right to peacefully assemble in a church without someone barging in with a gun and shooting up the place, the right to walk down a street. this is freedom, this is liberty. the second amendment is not the only amendment in the bill of rights that is at stake what we talk about being free from violence. in this environment today, we also have an extra added, i think, attention that needs to be paid to keeping guns out of the hands of people with

terrorist backgrounds. that's why a union form, although t comprehensive bac background check has the support of many. when are we going to follow public opinion? when with are we going to people what think and discontinue this idea of allowing a large echo chamber on the far right to distract. this is not about contraception, this is not about - this is about safety, this is about security. this is about the idea that in this country we lose ten times as many people to gun-related homicides than occurs in the e.u. they've got 200 million more people than we do. that's what this is about. it's about safety, security and common sense. i doubt if james maddison, one of the officers of the second amendment, which i might add

uses the word well regulated in its text, would oppose the notion in the 21 st century of broupd checks. the idea that we need to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people-- background checks. that is what this is all about you're shaking your head. >> thank you. i am. cnn, not to mention other networks, not to actually - let me step back. you've had a great week of programming. i thank you for allowing me to join this tonight. i want to say something. cnn announced or released their polling results. over half of americans say the president's is wrong to use executive actions and they're not going to work. there's a lot of common sense in the american people. also they're going to have a growing sense of anger with the establishment because it continues to make laws that won't work.

if someone wants to reach a consensus on gun control, how about a promise if it fails to receive the results and it gets resended. there is nothing more permanent than a temporary government program. i don't want a permanent unnecessary failing restraint on liberty. also just one quick - there's a huge drop in the enforcement of gun crimes. the obama administration, i think a 44% drop. he can't talk about it. he can't talk about the vudz. you have to resort to emotion and misleading claims. this is infuriating one technology the president supports is what is often called smart guns. they're guns that can't be fired by unauthorized users. we will be back with the look at weapons, the promise and the stay with us.

welcome back to inside story. this is a week that saw armed men occupy a federal buildings in an organise began park, a policeman gunned down on the streets of fill delicatessen fee and-- philadelphia and the president with executive orders, also the promise of so-called smart guns. this is from the town hall meeting in northern virginia last night >> now, to me this does not make sense. if you are a gun owner, i would think that you would at least want a choice so that if you wanted to purchase a firearm that could only be used by you, in part to avoid accidents in your home, in part to make sure that if it's stolen it's not used by a criminal, in part if there is an intruder, you pull

the gun but you - somehow it good gets wrestled away from you that can't be turned on you and used on you, i think there might be a market for that. you could sell that gun our guests are all still with me. this is a technology that was speculated about, was debated in state legislatures and essentially smotherred in the cradle. what happened? >> this is not an area of expertise for me. i'm here to talk about the constitutional issues, but essentially these are the types of legal products that could be put on the market and they were simply the same old slippery slope, the conspiracy, they're coming for our guns once they start having this technology, we won't be able to have real guns any more. i think it is the same kind of talk that has killed common sense gun regulations at the federal and state level, has helped to make this type of gun technology available and in addition we have congress which

has made it harder and harder to do the kind of safety research that would make our lives safer in dealing with guns and the president made a very important comment in his remarks which is that parents care very much about the car seats in their cars and we all want to have safe cars to drive, and yet guns are somehow off limits when it comes to safety research from one of the arguments put forward around these weapons was that one would drive out the other, almost like an ammunitions law where these guns once available all regular guns would disappear. a six-year-old wouldn't shoot his four year old brother with this gun. couldn't do it. there is some promise to it isn't there? >> one thing we should all - i'm assuming all share a concern about safe handling and storage of firearms so they're not mishandled and injure people. you know, in the past even the

schools, even in washington dc and nearby virginia had gun ranges and safety programs. we of less incidents then. most of these injuries and deaths caused include illegally owned guns. i don't have faith in the safety responsibility of a person who is a criminal in the first place who is not supposed to have a firearm, but the whole idea, the president proposal of technology is a fallacy. the president thinks nothing really happens unless the government is doing it. the if a private company wants to offer a smart gun, they can do it. it's the same concern with scientific research. the government might not be spending as much on research, but the level of research has remained the same and in some years has been more research completed than when the government paid for if. so americans are going to learn a listen here after the obama administration that all the promises made that president government is only wanting to do

things, really should not be believed go ahead. >> that's not about the government or the private sector. it's about the technology. should the government encourage the private sector to produce the technology? we do it in every other area. the idea is if we can use modern technology to make a safer gun, if we could create modern technology that may reduce the over 3,000 killings and injuries of children, then we should try it. if we can produce a technology in guns that, in fact, would prevent a criminal, and this is a huge problem, breaking into people's cars, breaking into people's houses, to steal a gun that is then used in the commission of a crime and then the gun is discarded. these are real problems that need to be addressed and what we need it less theoretical, follow sof kal conversations-- philosophical conversations

about the government and private sector and more real conversations about how we saw a significant problem in this country. we refuse to turn our backs on these tens of thousands of victims. we refuse to turn our backs on these 3,000 children. let's talk. there is a percentage, 5% of the offences that take place, the killings that take place in this country are people defending themselves i'm going to have to jump in because we're out of time >> that's a small measure of the hope if one of these smart guns was stolen, all you could do with it afterwards is hammer nails with it. i thank you, my guests, for your views. i will be back in a moment with a final thought on guns, numbers and scepticism. stay with it. it's "inside story".

last night's town hall brought together interested parties but not necessarily just plain folks. along with the nation leader of gun retailers and priest and campaigner for improving life in america's inner city. kelly, a retired navy captain and fighter pilot wondered how the president could seize 350 million guns. he clearly didn't think his gun was going to be seized and was contemptuous of the idea of what the president was going to try.

the president said keep those ideas alive helped the grid lock of guns and they were the friends of wanting to change things about how they sell use and buy firments. the idea the nra and others put forward is that almost any answer is no answer at all. police the sellers? police the buyers? no. change the guns themselves? no. if you've been following the debates of the last several years the answer of the nra and its allies put forward is to put more guns into more hands and more places than ever before, more open carry, fewer place where guns are prohibited. three seemingly opposed things are true at the same time. mur rates are low and getting-- murder rates - more private guns in private hands hand and more people die from fire related wounds than car accidents. it's hard to figure out the next "inside story"..

mexican police recapture fugitive drug s joaquin guzman six months after his escape from prison. you're watching al jazeera, i'm fauziah ibrahim, live from our headquarters in doha. resort city, injuring at least two tourists. >> a police chief is removed from his post following mass sexual assaults on women in the german city of cologne on new year's