New poll shows wish for more gun control at all time low

[X_Digger]

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/08/gun.control.poll/

(CNN) -- From Oakland, California, to Binghamton, New York, several mass shootings in recent weeks have killed dozens across the country. But has there been an effect on public opinion?

Yes, and in a surprising way.

Since 2001, most Americans have favored stricter gun laws, though support has slightly dropped in recent years: 54 percent favored stricter laws in 2001, compared with 50 percent in 2007, according to Gallup polling.

Now, a recent poll reveals a sudden drop -- only 39 percent of Americans now favor stricter gun laws, according to a new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll.

<snip>

Nearly all the decline in support for stricter gun laws is from people who don't identify themselves as Democrats. Six in 10 Democrats still support stricter gun laws, but support has dropped 13 points among Republicans and 17 points among independents. Half of all independents supported stricter gun laws in 2007; now only a third of them do.

61% want gun laws to stay the same or be relaxed.

tip of the hat to derby378 who posted about a site linking to an article that mentions this poll.

[onehandle]

1. Why are there any gun laws at all?

The Constitution is pretty clear. Guns are a right.

They should hand them out to toddlers as soon as they can hold them.

Hook 'em while they're young.

[X_Digger]

4. I learned to respect guns

When I was 7 or 8, I received comprehensive age appropriate gun safety instruction. I got my Daisy bb gun when I was 9, and a bolt action 22lr when I was either 10 or 11. I wasn't allowed to shoot by myself until I was 13 or 14. By 16, I was camping and hunting in the woods behind my house. Mm-mm-mm, rabbit and squirrel stew. Tasty.

I'm sorry, what was your point, again?

[benEzra]

9. So is free speech, press, religion, assembly, petition, and privacy.

The fact that those rights are not unlimited does not believe that arbitrary restriction is OK. Child porn is banned, but that does not allow the government to ban any publications it wants.

[tridim]

2. So you're proud to stand with the Republican whackjobs who skewed the poll?

Only in the gungeon.

[X_Digger]

5. I'm proud to stand with other pro-RKBA democrats and independents.

After all, in the last poll that had a significant number of respondents, about 1/2 of DU has a gun, and 1/2 of all gun owners are Dem or Independent.

[tridim]

8. Do you have a link to that recent DU poll?

Very few people here have a problem with responsible gun ownership, myself included.

If that poll is accurate (and was posted somewhere other than the gungeon where it would be inherently biased), I bet that most of the respondents own traditional small arms and not assault weapons. Not surprising if that's the case.

[benEzra]

11. Here's one from General Discussion...

...and so-called "assault weapons" are mainstream small arms (the most popular civilian rifles in America, in fact). The fact that your perception of civilian gun ownership is stuck in the 1950's does not mean that's where responsible gun owners live.

Yes, my wife and I both own so-called "assault weapons." I shoot competitively with mine, and hers is an antique collectible.

[Occam Bandage]

18. Aren't antique collectables usually excluded from gun-control legislation?

I think I recall seeing that in most gun-control laws.

[X_Digger]

21. pre-1898, if I recall correctly. n/t

[benEzra]

31. My wife's SKS is a pristine 1952 Tula (Russian), which the Brady Campaign and VPC wish to ban

as an "assault weapon." H.R.1022 would have banned them, and the VPC is also fighting for an import ban.

My wife's rifle (with aftermarket scope on a removable mount, so as not to alter the rifle's collectibility) and her Glock:



Gun-ban lobby scaremongering about SKS's:

http://www.bradycampaign.org/media/release.php?release=613
http://www.vpc.org/press/0705fortdix.htm
http://www.bradycampaign.org/media/release.php?release=1117
http://www.vpc.org/fact_sht/SKSfactsheet.pdf

FWIW, I have read that the SKS is the single most common centerfire rifle in U.S. homes, with at least seven million in U.S. homes. It has long since been passed in terms of annual sales by the AR-15 platform as SKS imports have slowed, but they're still going strong.

[X_Digger]

12. Let me find the screen cap..

It was posted in GD, but did eventually move to the gungeon. 775 respondends, if I recall correctly.

eta: March '07

eta2: benEzra beat me to it.

[jmg257]

7. "It is good to strike the serpent's head with your enemy's hand."

As long as that serpent is dumb ass attempts at gun control, the repubs can have at it!

ALL the pro-gun voices seem to be effective...so far. Let's hope the good news continues!

:toast:

[virginia mountainman]

13. Your obviously proud to stand for filthy Republicans..

That use you, as their sock puppet.

Sara Brady, to start off with....

The List of Vile Republicans, that are the LEADERS of the Anti-Civil Rights movements, is long...

And has been posted in here many many times....

But hey, what ever floats yer boat..

[tridim]

14. This is what floats my boat..

I am NOBODY'S puppet and 100% pro-Civil Rights. All my opinions on gun issues are my own.

Screw you for assuming that I'm a follower.

I'm not even sure what Sara Brady stands for these days, and I don't care. Her opinion has zero effect on my views on guns.

[virginia mountainman]

15. Really??

You sound like you got some of your talking points from her, in many of your posts...

But hey, if you would rather get " gun policy advise" from THEM instead of fellow Democrats, go ahead...

Just be aware, your last post pointed out just who, is the hypocrite...

Most of us in here, are 100% Civil rights too, just we don't make "exceptions"...like some...

We stand for all of them....

[tridim]

16. Go yell "fire" in a crowded theater, and after you get bailed out of jail..

Come back here and give us a report about how there are no "exceptions" to your civil rights.

I already told you I don't follow anyone's "gun policy advise" except my own. Are you that freaking dense?

[virginia mountainman]

20. What a poor, poor analogy......

Their is no 10 day waiting period on a mouth...

no restriction from taking a mouth, IN a crowded theater, because someone MIGHT yell fire...

No background check on a mouth...

No laws against even carrying or possessing a mouth....

LOL I could go on and on, but I won't lets cut to the crux of the matter...

Their is laws, against using a mouth improperly, like yelling fire, in a crowded theater, BUT their is no restrictions against it until you misuses it, and then you answer for it in a court of law..

Even if your found guilty of misusing a mouth, they will not take it from you, or ban possession for life because of it...

You REALLY need to double check Republican Sara Brady's arguments, before you attempt to use them on an informed populace.

[tridim]

24. Only a gun nut would apply modern gun laws to the original first amendment..

..and call it a valid argument.

My analogy was pointing out that you're not a "No Exception" civil rights advocate, and instead a massive hypocrite.

Not surprised that you completely missed the point, it's pretty common here.

[jmg257]

27. Only an idiot, or a liar, would use the "crowded theater" analogy to attempt to justify infringments

on the right to arms via typical gun control laws.

Which are you?


You want to enact laws to penalize people for the MISUSE of their rights, then go right ahead. But if you want to use the color of the law to instead implement blanket infringment on secured rights without due process, you better at the least have some damn strict scrutiny involved, otherwise fuck off.

[inkool]

25. If you are 100% pro-Civil rights...

Then why do you want to limit my first amendment right to self expression by banning guns based only on the way they look?

[Pullo]

33. Bling bans are OK, don't you know?

[inkool]

35. Oh, I know.

And since bling has no real definition (much like assault weapon) a ban on bling could be a ban on anything.

[Hangingon]

32. Gun control has roots in keeping guns out of minority hands.

[slackmaster]

26. The poll being discussed here was a real, scientifically conducted one, not an Internet "poll"

You seem to be unclear on the difference. People cannot successfully conspire to "DU" or "freep" a properly conducted survey.

[jody]

28. Prove poll results are skewed? Absent proof, it's more likely your opinion is skewered. n/t

[krispos42]

29. Remember,

The Republicans want Dems to pass anti-gun laws just as much as you want them to.




The problem with polls like this is that many people don't know what gun laws are currently in effect. Popular media and and the common talking-points generally give incorrect information, leaving about half the country (the half with no guns and no interest in shooting/owning them) with false impressions.

People seem to think that enforcement of existing laws is pretty good but there are just all those darn loopholes in there that let insane people buy guns by the gross, when the truth is that there are enforcement issues. I also feel we're probably done most of the reasonable things we can in terms of lawmaking, and further tightening would start crossing the line into "unreasonable".

:shrug:

[zipplewrath]

3. Gonna get in trouble.

This happened because the gun lobby has successfully created the perception that gun laws "don't work". The reason they were able to make this case of course is because the forced the gun control lobby to try incrementalism. Passing successively stricter gun control laws, especially at local levels, until they had restricted them enough to actually have an effect. It was doomed to failure. In order to pass enough "gun laws" to have any appreciable effect they were going to have to pass large, national, and sweeping gun restriction laws. They would have to be the kind with few "grandfather" features to them which would have resulted in "confiscation" or basically collection of weapons no longer legal. Until they did these things, the laws they did pass would have little effect at all, and in some cases merely increased the level of private gun ownership.

And they could not admit that this was the longer term goal. They couldn't even risk acknowledging that these possibilities existed, which resulted in not being able to pass any particularly effective "gun tracing" laws which would allow them to track weapons through various owners, much as we do with finger prints and DNA today. In the end, not acknowledging the fears and concerns of their opponents was their undoing. They instead tried various forms of "divide and conquer" pitting hunters against other weapons users, not to mention urbanites, less likely to have weapons, against more suburban/rural citizens.

There is a cautionary tale in all of this, for gun owners that is. Not acknowledging, and to some extent respecting, the concerns and points of view of your opponents is a good way to ultimately find yourself in a minority. The right incident, or sets of incidents, can cause rapid, and powerful moves in public opinion that will have less to do with facts, and more to do with perception. In the short term, the gun advocates should probably use this period of time to continue roll backs of the dumber, and least effective gun restrictions (gun, ammo, registration, etc.). The whole "Brady bunch" is in retreat and has little if any political clout anymore outside of some particular urban regions. And there is a President who seems to be the least sympathetic to their cause.

But just as the gun control lobby was very fond of silly "assault weapons" bans that didn't work, the whole "enforce existing gun laws" isn't particularly effective either. It isn't for all the same reasons drug laws don't work, or prositition, or gambling, etc. We ticket people who are speeding, not just those crashing. Waiting until someone has committed a crime to do anything will not be continually popular. The alcohol industry should be instructive for the gun lobby. They "got out in front" of the issue including the MADD folks.

The NRA and other organizations have very good gun safety programs, including for elementary school programs. Tailoring these to be "tolerable" to people who don't agree with them is an example of how to get "out in front" of some issues.

[X_Digger]

6. Here's a long (but good) read..

..as to why that approach may not work, either..

http://lawreview.law.wfu.edu/documents/issue.43.837.pdf

Many of us here in the gungeon are for new laws like letting private sellers (per their own discretion) access the NICS background check to make sure that a person isn't selling a gun to a prohibited person. Otherwise, I'm fine leaving the line where it is, and enforcing the laws we have- there's a huge disparity between the laws on the books and enforcement- many gun charges are plead down, or the prosecuting attorney chooses not to pursue them.

[zipplewrath]

17. True for all laws

I do wish we could teach to the population at large that passing a law is a long way from getting it prosecuted, and even longer from getting it punished. Prosecutors will ALWAYS plead down cases. The vast majority of laws are rarely used at all, despite being prepeatedly broken. The purpose of most laws is to empower the police because by breaking ANY of them it allows them to investigate ALL of them. Furthermore, many laws are hard to prove in court. So they won't regularly try. It makes a nice threat, and a great excuse to gather evidence, get warrants, make arrests, etc. It is why the gun lobby will always be able to complain about "not enforcing the laws already on the books". It will always be true, as it is for most laws, that most of the gun laws will never be regularly enforced. It is the flaw in the "enforce the laws" mantra of the gun lobby. It ignores the fact that the system isn't designed to do that.

The closest part of this strategy that has a chance of working is similar to what has been done with alcohol. We've taken a very narrow area of it and purshed it hard, basically drunk driving. We took another area and pushed the merchants, selling to minors. By impacting those two areas, and threatening consequences to merchants if they didn't get the use of the product under control, we've managed to reduce over all alcohol abuse. We still have problems in certain pockets associated with the prohibition nature of the product (something the gun control advocates should consider).

If you read your referenced paper, the repeated serious problem is the marginal/private weapons dealer. Any system that doesn't focus on that area of commerce is doomed to serious short comings.

[X_Digger]

22. Interesting numbers about expected non-compliance..

..and how long it would take to become 'gun free'.

Supply-side prohibitions of volatile items may work if they're large and/or complicated, but guns as a class are neither. (Thinking of an AK-47 clone that can be built from parts with common hand tools.)

[jeepnstein]

10. I'm fairly comfortable...

with the current state of affairs in my home state. Not everyone can say that. A few changes I'd like to see...

1) Make NICS available to face-to-face sellers.
2) Eliminate the 1986 closure of the NFA registry.
3) Incorporation of the 2nd Amendment...
4) Increasing the gun specification on violent felonies from three to a consecutive ten years.
5) Improved reporting of disqualifying conditions like involuntary commitment for mental illness, domestic violence, and the other laundry list of items that are featured on 4473.
6) I'd also like to see a resolution passed in Congress that designates a particular arm as the "standard" for the militia. How can you be well-equipped until you know what is the standard?
7) Increased efforts promoting proper storage and handling. If we can spend millions on smoker education why can't we do the same for safe gun handling?
8) Increased funding for CMP.
9) Increased prosecution for falsifying a 4473, or attempting to purchase a firearm while under disability. This means cracking down on straw buyers.
10) In my own state, I would particularly like to see carrying a concealed weapon without a permit classified as a Felony 5. CHL's are simple enough to obtain that lawful citizens wouldn't be threatened by such a move.

[Occam Bandage]

19. I am as well. DC vs. Heller changed many of my gun-control positions.

For instance, I still believe that city-wide pistol bans are a good thing for society, but they are unconstitutional, and as such I oppose them. It's unfortunate that the Supreme Court made such a decision, but I disapprove of unconstitutionality more than I disapprove of pistol ownership.

Most proposed gun-control legislation is either unconstitutional or is pointless (such as the AWB). I think trigger locks, registration, and waiting periods are all perfectly fine, though.

[krispos42]

30. They're probably legal and constitutional

I just doubt their effectiveness.

[jody]

23. "Six in 10 Democrats still support stricter gun laws"! Surprising there are so many people ignorant

about RKBA.

[Endangered Specie]

34. has more to do with urban vs rural...

people who live in urban areas are more likely to be Democrat and be anti-gun.

I bet if you asked those 6 in 10 Dems how many would be willing to put future electoral victories in jeopardy over new gun control, many would balk.

[jody]

36. Agree and as so many pro-RKBA Dems keep repeating, the anti-RKBA herd knows little or nothing about

existing laws and how they are not enforced and convicted criminals excused from serving time for using a firearm when committing a crime.