It's time to overcome timidity, the common wisdom and "consensus" seeking lawmakers — and move to the floor of the Senate all major proposals for gun control. Time to face down the opposition. Senators can recognize what a majority of Americans have now come to realize and accept.
On December 12, 2012, in a primary school in Henan province, China, a 30-year old man carrying a long knife and unfiltered rage inflicted a senseless attack on 22 helpless children and 1 adult at the Chenpeng village school. That fateful morning 23 victims were stabbed and wounded, and needed hospitalization.
In Henan China, 23 assault victims survived. In Newtown Connecticut, USA, 20 children and 6 adults succumbed to multiple gunshots. And lost their lives.
In the aftermath of the murders in Newtown, a convincing majority of Americans now desire curtailing assault weapons, says a recent poll from Quinnipiac University. In the April 4 poll, 59% favor a "nationwide ban" on the sale of assault weapons, and 36% are opposed.
Even in GOP-friendly regions, the support holds up. 58% in the West and 60% in the South favor the ban.
--- cross-posted at politicalcortex.com ---
For high capacity ammo magazines, a similar majority wants a "nationwide ban on the sale" of high capacity ammunition magazines that hold more than 10 bullets. 58% in favor, 38% opposed, and the same split in the West and Southern regions.
Also support for all these measures has been climbing slightly since February and March — time has not muted public opinion.
The opposition to banning the sale of assault weapons fell to 36% in April from just over 40% a month earlier. Same for the hi-capacity clips.
Driving home the public safety issue this week, at Lone Star Community College (Houston area), an assailant attacked 14 students with a knife. No fatalities. No grieving parents.
The Quinnipiac poll found almost no opposition at all to making background checks for buyers of guns universal. 91% in favor, 8% opposed (and 1% don't know). The lopsided support survives even in the face of worries that background checks could risk a possibility of confiscation.
So why do these checks and any safety gun proposals get watered down in a compromise bill in hopes of surviving a vote in the House and the Senate?
The Minority Majority
For that, you have to realize that Speaker John Boehner's "majority" of Republican lawmakers were actually elected by a minority of voters in 2012. That makes his caucus represent an indisputable minority, defying the majority will.
When the votes were counted for the November 6 election, "Democrats received 1.4 million more votes for the House of Representatives, yet Republicans won control of the House by a 234 to 201 margin. This is only the second such reversal since World War II."
In fact, it is democracy turned on its head. Because of redistricting from the 2010 dicennial remap, at least 10 states have districts where the split of elected congressmen defies the popular vote. That is, if more than 50% of voters vote for Democrats in most of these states, less than half the seats get awarded to the Democratic congressmen or women.
So in North Carolina, where the vote for the House was 51% Democratic and 49% Republican, a fair map would select 7 Democrats, 6 Republicans. The actual result in representatives sent to Washington? North Carolinians sent 4 Democrats and 9 Republicans.
In at least 10 states – Arizona, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, Virginia, Ohio, Florida, Illinois and Texas – the election of reps can't match the popular will. An estimated 1.7 million votes by Democratic voters are wasted by pack-and-crack gerrymandered districts, according to Princeton professor Sam Wang. The wasted Republican votes in these states are 70,000.
So next time John Boehner announces that public safety gun legislation needs to attract a "majority of the majority", it is truly the majority of the minority he is promoting.
When Marco Rubio, Lindsay Graham, or Ted Cruz talk obstruction of measures that Americans are coming around to support, know that they are bucking a majority tide.
The day of the fateful rampage in Newtown, Connecticut may recede from immediacy, but time may not be on the side of the minority in perpetuity.
The dominance of the minority may ride on borrowed time. If only Democrats like Dianne Feinstein, Harry Reid, Chuck Shumer, and a majority of senators and congressmen voting can assert the will of the majority of US citizens. That's a really big if.
politicalcortex.com