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The crime epidemic in Chicago has become international news, and New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, thinks that President Obama could be doing more to fight gun violence.

When probed about a shooting of a 5-year-old girl in New York, Kelly brought up what he sees as the president’s and former Republican candidate Mitt Romney’s lack of attention to national gun control.  “Maybe the city most affected [by guns] is Chicago,” Kelly said. “The President’s hometown. But barely a peep out of him.”

Although born and raised mostly in Hawaii, Obama calls Chicago his hometown, having lived there for several years.

While the city of New York netted record low homicide rates this year at 319 compared to 389 in 2011, Chicago has been plagued by violence throughout the year, reaching more than 400 homicides and counting, by the early fall.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has also called on the president to enforce a stricter gun policy. “Soothing words are nice, but maybe it’s time that the two people who want to be President of the United States stand up and tell us what they are going to do about it, because this is obviously a problem across the country,”  he said in July, following a shooting massacre at a Colorado movie theater. “There are so many murders with guns every day — it’s just got to stop.

“Instead of the two people – President Obama and Governor Romney – talking in broad things about (how) they want to make the world a better place, okay, tell us how. This is a real problem. No matter where you stand on the Second Amendment, no matter where you stand on guns, we have a right to hear from both of them concretely, not just in generalities – specifically what are they going to do about guns?”

In response to the uproar, Obama announced no change in the national right to bear arms.  “I believe the majority of gun owners would agree we should do everything possible to prevent criminals and fugitives from purchasing weapons, and we should check someone’s criminal record before they can check out a gun seller,” he told attendees of the National Urban League conference in New Orleans, over the summer.

The issue also came up during the second presidential debates in which Obama outlined a plan for a “broader conversation” about reducing violence in general. 

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Photo: NY Daily News