Has gun reform reached a tipping point?

Believers in gun control are starting to feel as intensely as gun rights supporters. Here's why that's a big deal.

The March For Our Lives in Houston.
(Image credit: AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

For about two decades now, pretty much everyone has accepted that on a national level, any kind of change in gun laws is impossible. Why is that? "The power of the National Rifle Association" is a common answer, but dig one layer deeper and what you'll hear is that the NRA's power comes from gun owners themselves, and how they're fundamentally different from your average voter who would rather see more restrictions on guns.

Let's imagine them as two next-door neighbors, Mitch and Alice, who are represented by all the same officeholders. Mitch owns a few guns and is a member of the NRA. He cares deeply about his Second Amendment rights — so deeply, in fact, that he won't consider voting for any politician who doesn't pledge to uphold them. The NRA helpfully offers him a regular stream of emails, texts, and written material telling him which politicians are on the right side. When they send out an alert asking him to contact his member of Congress or the state legislature about some pending gun issue, he does it. Meet him in a coffee shop or in his office, and Mitch is ready to talk guns, with well-honed arguments he's learned from listening to pro-gun media figures and talking to other gun owners.

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Paul Waldman

Paul Waldman is a senior writer with The American Prospect magazine and a blogger for The Washington Post. His writing has appeared in dozens of newspapers, magazines, and web sites, and he is the author or co-author of four books on media and politics.