And of course I must call b.s. when it is suggested that America should be awash in guns so that We the People can protect ourselves from some imaginary future tyranny. We've seen the once-revered Constitution shredded by a right-wing neo-fascist administration that spies, searches, imprisons, tortures, and cages dissent in a slow-moving coup d'etat that would have been unimaginable (and illegal) just six short years ago; all with nary a peep from the gun nut crowd. It is quite clear that the ONLY freedom gun owners care about is their right to own guns, and that as long as a tyrannical regime is smart enough to not mess with the gun lobby, the gun nuts will offer their fervent patriotic support.

Rush "Schickelgruber" Limbaugh, 04/17/07: "No gun control laws could have prevented [Monday's mass shooting]. Anyone with an IQ of 12 understands this."

Couldn't have said it better myself.

Rush "Schicklgruber" Limbaugh, 04/17/07: The solution to stopping the slaughter of America's students is prayer. (Christian, preferably.) And re-criminalizing abortions, because "the left's culture of death" -- Tottenkultur -- is the true cause of the gun carnage that makes America the laughing-stock and wonder of the civilized world.

Xanthro, Xanthro, Xanthro. Another mass student shooting, another couple of days or so on the internets strenuously trying to shoot down even the most reasonable arguments for even the most basic gun control laws. Of course, your reading of the Constitution is as ill-informed as your knowledge of foreign countries; and of course your whining about the onerousness (if any) of current so-called "gun control" laws is made laughable by the ease of "waiting periods" and of travel between states, and by gun show loopholes, etc.

But no matter. In the end, it comes down to this: I don't think the lives of 33 people in Virginia (or 16 at Columbine, etc.; the list is long) are well-sacrificed simply because you are too scared to live in a multi-racial society without a gun under your pillow at night. I don't care about your fears, and I don't care about your hobbies. They aren't worth the lives of the victims of even a single "law-abiding gun owner" gone over the edge. Period.

And sooner or later, demographics will change the red-blue balance; the electoral calculus will shift; and guns will be outlawed in the U.S. It will happen, and each new instance of mass gun carnage will hasten that day, no matter how many letters you write to Salon.

Oh, Xanthro. Poor, poor misguided Xanthro. Your attempt at responding was so weak as to be laughable and frankly unworthy of any further reply -- with one exception. You say that if and when 51% of the people want gun control, it will be difficult to implement.

51%? Nice try; but every survey I've seen shows that, depending on the exact wording, between two-thirds (66%) and three-fourths (75%) of Americans want real gun control.

Alas, due to a deeply flawed electoral system that awards states like Wyoming up to four times the per capita voting power of California and thus allows a rural red-state minority to wag the American dog, we have a federal govt that neither reflects nor respects the wishes of the majority of its citizens. 51%? As if! If it only took 51%, Xanthro, guns would have been banned long ago and 33 more students would be alive today.

Once more for Xanthro:

An amnesty period for turning in all guns in exchange for fair compensation, after which:

Gun Possession = 20 years (mandatory minimum for a first offense; no parole);

Gun Use = 30 years (same deal)

It's that simple. It might take one, five, or ten more massacres like the one that occurred yesterday; but sooner or later even the red-state dummies will get sick of the slaughter of schoolchildren and college students, and then America might join the civilized world. Don't bother responding, as you have zero credibility, and I am not interested in your opinions.

Alex Koppelman's article was about the politics of guns, not the rightness or wrongness of gun control. There ARE a good number of single-issue voters on the hot-button social issues such as guns, abortion, and gays; and rural/red-staters ARE disproportionately powerful under the anti-democratic U.S. electoral system. So the question is whether there is ANY reason for Democrats to want to push gun control as an issue in '08.

The easy answer is, of course, no. But with each new school shooting, America's soul dies just a little bit more; and I am confident that these massacres will not be allowed to go on forever. Sooner or later there will be too many Columbines and Virginia Techs -- too many days where a hitherto "law abiding gun owner" lines up a dozen or so young Amish girls in their classroom and assassinates them. Eventually, even red-staters will have had enough of this insane slaughter; a tipping point will be reached; and the U.S. will move to stop the gun carnage that is making it the laughing stock and wonder of the civilized world.

Has that tipping point now been reached? I don't know (perhaps because for me it was reached so long ago); but when it does come, I hope Democrats will be there to lead us.

Says LXGuy: "Gun control is a loser issue for democratic candidates and they know it. It's a democracy, that's the way it's supposed to work."

Sadly, No. If the U.S. were a democracy Al Gore would be president, and Congress would address school shootings, rather than pander to a small number of anti-abortion zealots. This is WHY the politics of the gun issue are so difficult for liberals. Poll after poll shows an overwhelming majority of Americans want real gun control; but the anti-democratic U.S. electoral system instead caters to the less sophisticated values of rural/red-staters.

If you doubt this, let's have a national referendum on gun control. One person, one vote; all votes get counted; and all votes count equally. In a word, democracy. Are you in?