Over the last week, I have been researching and writing a blog for this page about federal gun control and mental health as there seems to be a lot of misinformation and confusion out there. Come back next Tuesday to read it!) Along the way, I have learned many surprising and somewhat unrelated things.

When writing, I try to only get my facts from source documents. Anything in an article from ANY news agency is not fact to me unless I can back it up from an original document or straight from the horses mouth so to speak. The first question I wanted to answer in my blog was what, exactly, did President Trump repeal last February in relation to former President Obama’s efforts on gun control and mental health. (I found that answer, but I will save that for next week.) To do this, I went to the archives of the former President to read his actual Executive Orders. I was astounded! You have got to look at these and be awed by the scope of the presidency. There is everything from the minutiae of declaring government offices closed for Christmas, to restricting the funds of individuals related to various situations around the world, to making changes to the armed forces courts martial process. I decided right then and there that anyone who takes this job is a superhuman.

I’m sure some of you out there are taking exception to the previous paragraph where I addressed Barack Obama as “Former President”. Well, there’s isn’t just confusion on what has and hasn’t been done in relation to gun control. There’s even more confusion on how to name a former president. On formsofaddress.info, a consensus could not be obtained on whether they should be “The Honorable…”, “Former President…”, or simply “Mr. …”. As is my norm, I went to the “horses mouth” by way of the usa.gov website. Throughout the text it talks about former President George W. Bush, former President Barack Obama, etc. and yet, when it tells how to address them or introduce them, it says “Mr. Bush” and “Honorable George W. Bush”. Since even our government website couldn’t come to a consensus (or use their own terms correctly), I decided to go with “former President…” because, really, anyone who put up with the scope of that job for four to eight years should be called “President” forever.

Check out former President Obama’s Executive Orders here!