Every now and then, Slate gets something right. It doesn’t happen often, and even when it does, they’re able to get the right answer for all of the wrong reasons.
That’s because the people they talk to really don’t know what’s going on inside the minds of people who aren’t uber leftists, so they engage in strawman arguments, but some truths are so obvious that it’s impossible for them to miss, even with the strawmanning.
A case in point is a recent piece from them about how no one should hold their breath that the back-and-forth over gun rights between folks like us and the Trump administration will actually cause anyone to turn on Trump.
As Cornell told Slate, there’s the libertarian wing that holds a sweeping view of gun rights, so much so it characterizes the right to defend oneself “as basic a human right as there is.” Then there’s the Christian nationalist view, which is also quite sweeping but believes only white, “pure blood” Americans deserve to bear arms. Finally, there is the old law-and-order bucket, which includes many Bush and Reagan Republicans who had a recent history of supporting some gun control.
Cornell offers that the Trump administration is seeking to revive the old law-and-order school of thought now that it’s convenient, and will largely get away with it. Pool, for his part, is already boasting again of his support for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, saying of federal law enforcement, “I’m not licking the boot. It’s my boot. I voted for it. I’m the one stomping.” Rob Doar, general counsel for the Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus, conceded that the group was disappointed in the Trump administration’s response to Pretti’s death and it has created skepticism among those who support Trump. However, these members are “still overall pleased with the general state of things,” with Doar noting to Slate that the administration has intervened in court cases in favor of the 2nd Amendment, made gun-friendly policy changes within the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and on the whole been friendly to the 2nd Amendment.
In Cornell’s view, all the major figures in the conservative movement who may disagree with Trump now are more than likely to eventually fall back in line. “It’s hard to imagine those people are going to embrace telling people to bring their guns to ICE protests, right?” Cornell said. “Will this be the last we hear from the NRA? Or will they really harp on this and make it an issue? My suspicion is no, because it doesn’t help the Republicans” in future elections, Cornell noted.
First, the idea of Christian Nationalists being super prevalent and only believing white, native-born Americans have a right to keep and bear arms is grossly overstated. There are a few people who lean in that direction, and they’re loud, but few of them would espouse any such thing. Yes, even if some of them think it.
Maybe it’s just me, but as Saul Cornell, here is a historian, not a political scientist, and an anti-gun one at that, so they should take anything he says with a grain of salt.
The truth isn’t that no one will harp on this issue because it doesn’t help Republicans, though. Oh no, that’s not it in the least.
It’s that even with this kind of rhetoric coming from the administration right now, they’re still infinitely better than the average Democrat running for office when it comes to the Second Amendment.
The Trump administration has already done more for gun rights than any president I’ve seen in my 52 years on this planet. Gavin Newsom won’t do that for us. He can make a thing about how Trump doesn’t support the Second Amendment now, but he’s also the guy trying to repeal it. He doesn’t have a leg to stand on, and there’s absolutely no reason to trust him over the guy who pushed to kill the tax stamp on suppressors and short-barreled long guns.
It’s not about helping Republicans so much as it’s about not siding with the guys who would strip us of everything if they got half a chance simply out of spite, because the president and his people didn’t say the right things.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not happy about those comments, if for no other reason than they’ll be trotted out for the next 20 years whenever they’re convenient, but I’m not about to shoot myself in the foot and neither is anyone else.
So yeah, no one is going to turn on Trump here, but not because of some ingrained allegiance to the Republican Party.
It’s because the Democrats refuse to offer anyone a viable alternative when it comes to gun rights. So, we take what we can get like everyone else, and we’re not going to let the perfect be the enemy of the close enough.
Editor’s Note: President Trump and Republicans across the country are doing everything they can to protect our Second Amendment rights and right to self-defense.
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