Poll: FEWER Americans support an assault weapons ban!

[jmdrake]

Some good news at least.

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/3966592-fewer-americans-support-assault-weapon-ban-survey/

Fewer Americans support assault weapon ban: survey
BY OLAFIMIHAN OSHIN - 04/24/23 1:37 PM ET

Less than half of Americans in a new Monmouth University Poll said they’ll support an assault weapons ban in the country, down from a similar poll taken last year.

The poll, published on Monday, found that 46 percent of respondents said they’d support the banning of future assault weapons sales in the country, while 49 percent of those surveyed said they would oppose a ban.


That marks a nine-point drop from the 55 percent of respondents who supported a ban in a June 2022 poll, which came in the wake of the Uvalde, Texas, school shooting, in which a teenage gunman with an AR-15 style rifle shot dead 19 students and two teachers.

This year has again seen a deadly string of mass shootings, including a shooting at a Christian school last month that left three students and three adults dead. The shooter had three guns, including an AR-15-style rifle, and reportedly fired 152 rounds during the attack.

The new poll found majority support for some other gun control measures.

Nearly three-quarters of respondents said they’ll support a federal red flag law that would allow police to temporarily take away the guns of someone who poses a threat to themselves or others. And 81 percent said they would support a measure requiring comprehensive background checks for all gun purchasers.

Asked whether U.S. states should be allowed to limit who can carry a concealed weapon by requiring permit applicants to demonstrate they need the weapon for their current employment or protection, 56 percent of respondents said yes.

This year has already seen 173 mass shootings, according to the gun violence archive, including an attack on a bank in Louisville, Ky., earlier this month in which five people died.

Democrats are once against pushing for legislation to address gun violence in Congress; however, Republicans remain largely opposed to those efforts.

Some efforts are being pursued at the state level.

Tennessee’s Republican Gov. Bill Lee signed an executive order in the wake of the Nashville school shooting strengthening background checks for gun purchases.


Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) signed several gun safety measures into law earlier this month after recent shootings at Oxford High School and Michigan State University.

The Monmouth University Poll was conducted from March 16 to 20, with 805 respondents participating in the survey. The poll’s margin of error was 5.8 percentage points.​

 

[Anti Federalist]

Good...perhaps all is not lost.

If we could just get people to carry over that thinking to everything else.

 

[Anti Federalist]

Bump yes we are making a dent

 

[jmdrake]

Good...perhaps all is not lost.

If we could just get people to carry over that thinking to everything else.

Of course it ain't lost. We're actually winning on all fronts. Why do you think they had to fire Tucker Carlson? His nightly monologue was clear and present danger to them. We've got the GOP split over the war in Ukraine with both frontrunners openly against it. Fauci is having to lie and claim he was never for closing schools. Kamala Harris didn't receive the warm welcome in Africa she was expecting. Biden has been reduced to arresting black political dissidents on his political left. And the Bud Light marketing executives responsible for the Dylan Mulvaney fiasco have been forced to take a leave of absence.

Have you ever read the book "A Connecticut Yankee In King Author's Court?" Our high school English teacher (private Christian school) read it to us over multiple periods. This passage in the next to the last chapter spells out where we are. The lead character had a group of 52 young men with him. Arrayed against them were 30,000 knights and nobles and most of the rest of England. The phrase "All England marches against us" had gone through the camp. Only, as the protagonist pointed out, most of the rabble would disperse after the first bloody nose.

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/86/86-h/86-h.htm#c42

I had spies out every night, of course, to get news. Every report made things look more and more impressive. The hosts were gathering, gathering; down all the roads and paths of England the knights were riding, and priests rode with them, to hearten these original Crusaders, this being the Church’s war. All the nobilities, big and little, were on their way, and all the gentry. This was all as was expected. We should thin out this sort of folk to such a degree that the people would have nothing to do but just step to the front with their republic and—

Ah, what a donkey I was! Toward the end of the week I began to get this large and disenchanting fact through my head: that the mass of the nation had swung their caps and shouted for the republic for about one day, and there an end! The Church, the nobles, and the gentry then turned one grand, all-disapproving frown upon them and shriveled them into sheep! From that moment the sheep had begun to gather to the fold—that is to say, the camps—and offer their valueless lives and their valuable wool to the “righteous cause.” Why, even the very men who had lately been slaves were in the “righteous cause,” and glorifying it, praying for it, sentimentally slabbering over it, just like all the other commoners. Imagine such human muck as this; conceive of this folly!

Yes, it was now “Death to the Republic!” everywhere—not a dissenting voice. All England was marching against us! Truly, this was more than I had bargained for.

I watched my fifty-two boys narrowly; watched their faces, their walk, their unconscious attitudes: for all these are a language—a language given us purposely that it may betray us in times of emergency, when we have secrets which we want to keep. I knew that that thought would keep saying itself over and over again in their minds and hearts, All England is marching against us! and ever more strenuously imploring attention with each repetition, ever more sharply realizing itself to their imaginations, until even in their sleep they would find no rest from it, but hear the vague and flitting creatures of the dreams say, All England—All England!—is marching against you! I knew all this would happen; I knew that ultimately the pressure would become so great that it would compel utterance; therefore, I must be ready with an answer at that time—an answer well chosen and tranquilizing.

I was right. The time came. They had to speak. Poor lads, it was pitiful to see, they were so pale, so worn, so troubled. At first their spokesman could hardly find voice or words; but he presently got both. This is what he said—and he put it in the neat modern English taught him in my schools:

“We have tried to forget what we are—English boys! We have tried to put reason before sentiment, duty before love; our minds approve, but our hearts reproach us. While apparently it was only the nobility, only the gentry, only the twenty-five or thirty thousand knights left alive out of the late wars, we were of one mind, and undisturbed by any troubling doubt; each and every one of these fifty-two lads who stand here before you, said, ‘They have chosen—it is their affair.’ But think!—the matter is altered—All England is marching against us! Oh, sir, consider!—reflect!—these people are our people, they are bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh, we love them—do not ask us to destroy our nation!”

Well, it shows the value of looking ahead, and being ready for a thing when it happens. If I hadn’t foreseen this thing and been fixed, that boy would have had me!—I couldn’t have said a word. But I was fixed. I said:

“My boys, your hearts are in the right place, you have thought the worthy thought, you have done the worthy thing. You are English boys, you will remain English boys, and you will keep that name unsmirched. Give yourselves no further concern, let your minds be at peace. Consider this: while all England is marching against us, who is in the van? Who, by the commonest rules of war, will march in the front? Answer me.”

“The mounted host of mailed knights.”

“True. They are thirty thousand strong. Acres deep they will march. Now, observe: none but they will ever strike the sand-belt! Then there will be an episode! Immediately after, the civilian multitude in the rear will retire, to meet business engagements elsewhere. None but nobles and gentry are knights, and none but these will remain to dance to our music after that episode. It is absolutely true that we shall have to fight nobody but these thirty thousand knights. Now speak, and it shall be as you decide. Shall we avoid the battle, retire from the field?”

“NO!!!”

The shout was unanimous and hearty.

“Are you—are you—well, afraid of these thirty thousand knights?”

That joke brought out a good laugh, the boys’ troubles vanished away, and they went gaily to their posts. Ah, they were a darling fifty-two! As pretty as girls, too.

I was ready for the enemy now. Let the approaching big day come along—it would find us on deck.​

 

[Anti Federalist]

Have you ever read the book "A Connecticut Yankee In King Author's Court?"

Of course, my favorite of Clemens's works.

You make a fair point.

Let's hope you are right.