2014 Election Do or Die for Firearm Freedom

That's the way the NRA put it in this piece by Paul Bedard of the Washington Examiner.

David Keene, former NRA president, said gun voters are motivated. Acknowledging that the president muddied the gun issue in the 2012 election, Keene said, “Now they know, and gun owners are like other people: Once fooled, the second time, it doesn’t work. So they know what the opposition is, they know how close it is in the Senate, they know that the Supreme Court could be at stake in the next few years.”

What will this mean for the re-election hopes of Mark Warner?  Warner coasted to victory in 2008 after receiving and "A" rating from the NRA (but no endorsement) in part due to his record of signing every pro-gun piece of legislation while he was governor.  He was never tested on anti-gun legislation because none passed the General Assembly.  Having given lip service to supporting bans on modern sporting rifles (so-called "assault weapons") in 2001, he kept quiet on the topic in 2008 and voted against the renewal and expansion of the ban last April (though there is some question as to how he would have voted had the vote been close, given comments he made after Sandy Hook).   He did however vote for the Manchin/Schumer/Toomey amendment to criminalize private sales of firearms and he has voted for both Supreme Court nominees that President Obama has nominated - justices who have gone on to vote on the anti-gun side of Second Amendment cases before the Supreme Court.