According to the AP, they are asking how they lose. Lots of sad pandas to go around:
“We’ll probably end up passing more gun bills” that expand owners’ rights “than we did during the Republican administration,” said Rep. Carolyn McCarthy, D-N.Y., a leading gun control advocate. “That is what surprises me.”
You know, that’s surprising me too. It must be that shoulder thing that goes up. But how about that Congressman David Price’s snub to the Brady Campaign here:
“People do not want to be on the wrong side of this particular cultural divide,” said Rep. David Price, D-N.C., who supports tougher gun controls. “It’s too bad there’s not a more responsible national organization” to counteract the NRA, he said.
Ouch, that’s gotta hurt. Even I wouldn’t be that harsh. The Brady’s were worthy opponents in their heyday, it’s just that once the grass roots gun owners got pissed off and fired up, they had nothing to counter it.
Rep. Lynn Woolsey of California is another Democrat frustrated by the gun debate. When she asks colleagues why they don’t support tougher restrictions, she said, they reply, “You just don’t get it, Woolsey. You don’t have our districts.”
Woolsey doesn’t get it because she’s from one of the few areas in the country where there isn’t much in the way of gun rights activists to make her life difficult. As much as it’s tempting to say we’ve lost six or so states to gun control, it’s not really true. There’s only a few metro areas making California anti-gun, but those districts represent a lot of people, and in those districts, it’s probably more important that their rep makes a peace statement on memorial day, than honoring our veterans. We lost New York City in 1911, and people took their cultural attitudes on guns with them when there was the mass exodus from cities in the late 20th century. What gun control advocates are finding is that controlling a few legacy metropolitan areas isn’t enough, and the ripples being created by Heller are likely to undo even that. It has to be frustrating, but I can’t say I feel sorry for them.