James Werrell: Gun lobby opposes even sensible measures

The Republican response to President Barack Obama’s executive order on guns was swift, predictable and dismaying. It prompts the question of whether the Republican Congress will ever do anything – anything – to reduce gun violence in this country.

This is Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan responding at a Wednesday press conference to Obama’s actions: “It would be nice if he would actually focus on defeating ISIS, on calling radical Islamic terrorism what it is, instead of talking about how we can intimidate and frustrate the Second Amendment rights of law abiding citizens.”

The previous day, Ryan had issued a formal statement: “From day one, the president has never respected the right to safe and legal gun ownership that our nation has valued since its founding. ... His words and actions amount to a form of intimidation that undermines liberty.”

Could Ryan possibly be referring to the modest package Obama announced Monday? The most significant provision in the package requires people who sell large numbers of guns for profit on the Internet or at gun shows to be licensed, and to conduct background checks on potential buyers. Another measure would devote $500 million more in federal money to treating mental illness.

Frustrating Second Amendment rights? Showing lack of respect for legal gun ownership? Undermining liberty?

If you read only Ryan’s response, you’d think Obama had ordered federal agents to start confiscating guns.

The retort from the gun lobby was equally predictable.

Gun Owners of America already has announced that it will mount legal challenges to Obama’s proposals and also will urge Congress to cut off funding for the proposals to beef up staffing for background checks and to investigate online gun sales.

After all, we can’t have federal authorities impeding felons from buying guns on the Internet, can we?

The rabid backlash from GOP congressional leaders, the National Rifle Association and other members of the gun lobby, while inevitable, also seems especially tin-eared this time. It fails in every way to acknowledge that Americans are concerned about the tens of thousands of gun-related deaths each year.

It also seems like a missed opportunity for a sensible Second Amendment advocate to reach out and find common ground with those who worry about our seeming inability to do anything about the insane amount of gun violence. There must be one gun rights advocate somewhere willing to admit: “You know, there’s really nothing wrong with closing the loopholes on background checks where large volumes of guns are changing hands.”

Politicians might take note of polls showing that a significant majority of voters support background checks and better mental health screening for potential gun buyers.

In other words, Obama’s package of executive orders is a political winner nationally.

The problem, of course, is that it might not be a winner locally. Even if most of the rest of the country favors efforts to reduce gun violence, that still might be taboo in many congressional districts.

Gun enthusiasts have an outsized influence. They are active, they are committed, gun rights are their top issue, and they always vote.

That can’t be said about gun safety advocates, who tend to vote on a wider range of issues. But the winds might be shifting.

Obama apparently thinks so. He said in his speech Monday, during which he occasionally became teary-eyed, that he acted unilaterally simply because he has grown angry and frustrated about the failure to address gun violence. He conceded that he wants to make it a prominent issue in the 2016 campaign.

Voters may finally be fed up with inaction regarding the unending epidemic of gun-related deaths. At some point – who knows, maybe this year – the obstructionists, the ones who throw up roadblocks to even minor gun safety measures, could pay a political price.

This story was originally published January 8, 2016 at 10:07 AM with the headline "James Werrell: Gun lobby opposes even sensible measures."