Let’s get something done. Here’s what I propose. Let’s restrict access to semi-automatic rifles and magazines that hold more than 10 rounds. Let’s require universal background checks. Would doing so stop all gun violence? Of course not. But it would help. I bet there would be a few less dead ten year olds in Texas right now if we’d kept the 1996 assault weapons ban in place.
Here’s my real message: Give us this. Give us this compromise position. Because if you don’t, if you make us all suffer through another decade or two of this carnage, wait until enough of your old white voters die, then you know what we’ll do? We’ll just take them all. Give us nothing today, let the country suffer, and we’ll just take all your damned guns at the earliest opportunity. If you can’t be responsible with guns then you can’t have guns.
I’m kind of reminded of the Affordable Care Act and how you Republicans lost your fucking minds over it. You tried to stop it, tried to end it, tried to sabotage it. And while you weren’t able to end it outright, you have done a pretty good job of making sure it’s as ineffective as possible.
But you know what? Obamacare was the compromise position. It was the last life preserver tossed to the private health insurance industry. If it didn’t work, you know what would be next? Medicare For All. If you don’t allow a compromise position to work, you leave us no choice but to go for the gold.
So about those semi-automatic rifles and those background checks. Honestly I sometimes wonder what exactly you’re so afraid of. They’re both very popular proposals. Even a majority of NRA members want universal background checks for fuck’s sake.
So just do it. Give us something. Let’s be a country that’s responsible with guns.
Or there will be no guns in the future.