BELLEVUE, WA – Friday’s announcement by President Barack Obama that he will keep pushing for so-called “smart gun” technology during his final year in office is proof that he wants gun control to be a cornerstone of his legacy, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms said.

“The president is stubbornly clinging to the notion that he can convince American citizens to trust their safety to a so-far unreliable technology and push the country toward some sort of Utopia,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. “His last-ditch effort to force industry and the public to accept his delusion that adding features to firearms that may make them less reliable in an emergency is nothing short of a compulsion.

“Friday’s report from the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security and Defense clearly notes that efforts so far have fallen short,” he continued. “The country is still suffering from a lethargic economy, we’re facing a serious terrorist threat at home and abroad, our military needs attention, and Obama is preoccupied with this gun control fetish.”

The president continues to refer to these efforts as “common sense steps” to prevent accidents, Gottlieb noted, but instead of placing so much emphasis on questionable research, the same safety goals could be met through public education, including safety courses as part of the public school curriculum.

“We have never opposed research and development of safer firearms,” Gottlieb said, “but any design features that require RFID chips or other electronic technology that might fail in an emergency isn’t going to save lives, it will only put good people at risk. That amounts to accomplishing less than nothing.

“This is just a bunch of anti-gun hot air that will do nothing to reduce violence and help fund and organize attacks on the Second Amendment,” he concluded.