Republicans’ indifference to the massacres of innocents will lead to their ruin
Opinion | The Washington Post Editorial
Board appeals to Trump and Congress to stand up to the gun lobby and
prevent mass shootings.
When
I walked away from Donald Trump’s Republican Party, I did not walk away
from conservatism. Instead, I gave up on a political party whose
policies had become indefensible.
I
support a pathway to citizenship for the “dreamers,” but my approach to
immigration is far less expansive than that of most Democrats. I opposed
the Republicans’ deficit-financed tax cuts, but I still believe that
any Americans paying more than a third of their salaries to the
government are being ripped off.
And once
again, I and many other reasonable conservatives find ourselves at odds
with GOP — read: National Rifle Association — orthodoxy.
.
After
the Sandy Hook school shooting, I began calling for tougher background
checks and a ban on assault-style weapons. But I continued to celebrate
the Supreme Court’s 2008 ruling that the Second Amendment protects
Americans’ right to keep and bear arms. I was relieved the court
confirmed that citizens have a constitutional right to possess handguns
at home for the purpose of protection. And, unlike most Democrats, I am
uncomfortable with state laws that severely restrict Americans’ right to
have similar protection outside their homes
For most Americans, my view on guns would be considered conservative. But for Republican leaders and the NRA lobbyists who funnel millions
to the GOP each year, conservatives such as me are just as out of touch
as liberals who want to ban handguns and obliterate all Second
Amendment protections.
They are dead wrong.
More than 90 percent of Americans agree that Congress should pass tougher background checks.
More than 80 percent of Americans at least somewhat favor a ban on “bump stocks” that make rifles fire much like automatic weapons.
And nearly 80 percent believe that assault-style weapons should be banned.
If
Trump and the NRA try to tell you it is your God-given, constitutional
right to stockpile weapons of war, they are lying. But don’t take my
word for it. In District of Columbia v. Heller, Supreme Court
Justice Antonin Scalia ruled that the regulation of gun ownership was
compatible with the Second Amendment. That “important limitation . . .
is fairly supported,” Scalia wrote, “by the historical tradition of
prohibiting the carrying of ‘dangerous and unusual weapons.’ ”
You
would think that the ruling of a conservative legend such as Scalia
would provide courage to Republicans who want to end the epidemic of
mass shootings. Or they could stand with Ronald Reagan. His pleas to
lawmakers helped lead to the 1994 ban on assault-style weapons .
After
losing to the Gipper, NRA lobbyists in Washington lost their minds.
They all but declared war on America’s government while comparing law
enforcement officers to Nazis. These “jack-booted government thugs”
wanted to “take away our constitutional rights, break in our doors,
seize our guns, destroy our property and even injure or kill us.”
Post opinions writers Molly Roberts, Karen
Tumulty, Christine Emba and E.J. Dionne discuss the political spin
surrounding the Parkland, Florida school shooting.
That extreme approach
continues today, with NRA-funded ads coming ever closer to inciting
violence against politicians and other public figures who dare to push
back against their nihilism.
Maybe the
gun lobby is panicking because history is not on its side. Since 1994,
the number of hunters in the United States has fallen to about 15
percent. As Kurt Andersen noted in his book “Fantasyland: How America Went Haywire ,” just 3 percent of Americans own roughly half of the country’s guns. Three out of four Americans do not even own a gun.
The
NRA and Trump’s Republican Party face a political landscape where
neither history nor poll numbers are on their side. Americans want
stronger background checks, a ban on bump stocks and assurances that
military-style weapons will stop finding their way into the hands of
terrorists, domestic abusers and the mentally ill.
Poll
after poll proves I am not the one out of touch. Conservative voters,
rank-and-file Republicans and an overwhelming number of Americans share
these views. GOP politicians and the gun lobbyists they represent live
in a bubble. Their indifference to the massacres of innocents will lead
to their political ruin. Then, and only then, can we have an honest
debate on the epidemic of guns in America.
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