Will it be possible to pass significant new gun legislation? The odds are long, but one thing that might help it along is the fact that the NRA has become so batshit crazy over the past couple of decades. Every time Wayne LaPierre’s spittle-flecked ranting shows up on your TV screen, I’d guess the gun control movement picks up another percentage point of support. Ditto for every time some nutball decides to sling an AR-15 over his shoulder and wander through a mall “just to show that he can.” And ditto again when some backbench member of Congress gets a bit of airtime for fulminating against the UN’s black helicopters.
Today’s case in point is on the right. “Are the president’s kids more important than yours?” the NRA asks. Why does Obama think Sasha and Malia deserve Secret Service protection but your children don’t? He’s a hypocrite!
The NRA must be desperate to break one of the fundamental laws of politics: you never involve the president’s kids. Even Rush learned that lesson. But they just don’t know when to quit. The NRA has gone so far around the bend that it doesn’t seem to occur to them anymore that stuff like this disgusts most normal Americans, and it’s something that even their allies in Congress can’t support.
The NRA is at once our bitterest enemy and our best friend when it comes to gun regulation. If they keep producing stuff like this, they just might lose this battle after all.
