“I talked to nearly a dozen Republicans in the House and Senate for this story,” atlantic.com writer Elaina Plott reveals, “and heard nearly a dozen different proposals for how to curb gun violence and mass shootings. They all said they wanted GOP leadership to address gun violence in a meaningful way. It’s not possible to have conversations, they told me, if there’s nothing on the table to talk about.” In other words . . .
Republicans for gun control!
To be charitable, perhaps the plot thickens. Maybe the Republican pols schmoozing with the East Coast media maven were just pretending to be pro-gun control, in private, with a liberal writer. After all, their lips were moving.
Or maybe none of these unidentified proposals weren’t gun control per se. Maybe they were anti-crime or mental health proposals.
One thing’s for sure: just because a politician declares themselves to be a pro-gun Republican, just because the NRA blesses them with an A rating, doesn’t make them a friend of ours.
To wit: the Republican lawmakers who betrayed The People of the Gun in the once [and let’s hope future] Gunshine State, enacting a raft of gun rights rollbacks in response to astroturfed post-Parkland teenage histrionics.
Is there a single dependable pro-gun politician in this country? If not, how do we hold ostensibly pro-gun Republicans’ feet to the fire when the only alternative is politicians belonging to a party that would restrict the right to keep and bear arms right out of existence?