How does Everytown Match Up With the NRA

After Everytown for Gun Safety announced they were going to put out a candidate survey and make it public this election cycle, the Christian Science Monitor decided to see how the group matches up with NRA.  Everytown should be taken seriously when you have $50 million at your disposal.  The Monitor notes that Bloomberg obviously has the edge in money, but that NRA's real strength is in mobilization:

He’s right. The NRA’s real strength is its ability to mobilize voters – to get them off of their couches and to the phones, to meetings and rallies, to letter writing and e-mailing, to leafleting, and to the voting booth. While 90 percent of Americans may support expanding background checks to the Internet and gun shows, getting them to act is something else entirely. 

And, that 90 percent isn't really 90 percent when you dig a little deeper.

The article also repeats another myth - that less people own firearms than did in the 1970's and that is what the Monitor points to as possibly why Everytown may have long term success:

Everytown leaders say yes, and the trend lines are on their side, according to the General Social Survey by NORC, a research center at the University of Chicago. A New York Times analysis of the survey data shows the share of American households that have guns declining from 50 percent in the 1970s to 34 percent today, though the NRA contests the figures.

"Demographics work against gun ownership," says Professor Spitzer.

It's not like the NRA is not working to reach out to those changing demographics.  I'm betting those who say a large number of gun owners aren't going to tell a stranger on the phone they own firearms, regardless of whether they identify themselves as working for a pollster, are right.  All you have to do is a simple Internet search and you will find articles about the increased demand trainers see in their firearm classes.  I'm thinking that's not driven by people who are long time gun owners.

Christian Science Monitor Apparently Among 88% That Don't Know Firearm Related Crime is Declining

The Christian Science Monitor had this article yesterday asking "Is price of an armed America a more dangerous America."  You get the message from the story's title that America is an increasingly dangerous place.  Fact: Over the last twenty years homicides committed with a firearm have declined 49%.  However, the Pew Research Survey that found that little factoid also noted that only 12% of the public knew crime had decreased.

At the same time the Monitor article notes more women are target practicing and taking concealed carry classes (complete with video of a news story on home invasions targeting women), they also trot out this comment from the gun ban lobby:

Gun-control advocates consequently see the gun-carry movement as populated at least in part by white men who feel politically unempowered and who may be inclined to indulge in displays of extra muscle and power over their fellow citizens.

Professor Glenn Reynolds notes in the article that U.S. Supreme Court decisions like Heller "defined new parameters of self-defense and the carrying of firearms, making it more acceptable." And it is the broader acceptance that has likely lead to a 101% increase in firearm sales in Virginia between 2006 and 2012.  For those who think more guns equal more crime, with all those new firearms in the hands of Virginian's,  the Commonwealth's violent crime rate is the 4th lowest in the nation.  Maybe the Monitor should have looked at those numbers before asking if the trade off for a more armed America is a more dangerous America.

The Gun Control Version of MADD

That's how this Christian Science Monitor article described Moms Demand Action.

The number of gun control groups nationwide has doubled in the past year – some led by small coalitions of Sandy Hook survivors, others led by mothers not directly touched by the tragedy. Many experts cite Moms Demand Action as a growing legislative force on behalf of gun control, where suddenly state legislators across the US are being confronted by women demanding change – a kind of Mothers Against Drunk Driving redux.

The article, just one of many on the gun control landscape since last year's Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, goes on to point out that the number of pro-rights bills passed last year were more than double the number of gun control bills passed:

Moreover, since the Sandy Hook massacre, states have approved no fewer than 93 laws that protect and affirm gun rights – more than double the number of control laws. Because many of those new laws liberalized the carrying of concealed weapons, it’s basically easier to get and use a gun today than it was a year ago, Paul Barrett, author of “Glock: The rise of America’s gun,” told WBUR in Boston on Dec. 5.

I don't know if it is easier to get a firearm  than it was a year ago, but just as this blog did yesterday, the article noted that the states that passed restrictions, were states that already all but ban firearms:

In the past year, eight US states – mostly blue ones in New England and the coastal West, but also “purple” Colorado – approved gun control legislation. In New York and Connecticut, they weren’t merely symbolic changes, either, but rather bans on certain kinds of magazines and guns. The result in New York City, at least, is that some gun owners are getting letters from authorities demanding that they turn in their weapons.

As Sebastian pointed out yesterday, the New York Times had a great interactive piece on what states passed which laws.  Clearly, while we lost some battles, we won a lot more than we lost.  We just need to stay active as new legislative sessions will begin in January.