Taking On Issues - Political Issues and Government Policies

A Hot Discussion Forum on Government Policies and Political Issues

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • Election 2016
  • Big Government
  • Healthcare
  • The Other Side
  • What’s New
  • Your Freedom

Poll: Dems should really run on gun control in the midterms

August 1, 2018 By Takingonissues

Have Americans turned against the Second Amendment? “The center has shifted on this issue,” one source in Roll Call’s report tells Nathan Gonzales, but has the center really shifted on gun control? It depends on the view, apparently. Gonzales reports that a new poll shows that Democrats have the upper hand in the gun-control debate, but this might be a trap:

Gun control has been a third rail of Democratic campaigns, but a new poll suggests that Democratic candidates should embrace a bolder approach to restrictions on guns, even in general elections. …

It modeled three different base Democratic messages against a standard conservative message. The first base message talked about the economy, education and health care. The second base message included those same issues along with a “moderate” gun message, including protecting the Second Amendment and universal background checks, and “keeping guns out of dangerous hands.” The third base message included the same initial issues along with a more progressive gun message that combined a commitment to an assault weapons ban with a call for fewer guns and making them harder to get.

The first option prevailed over a conservative candidate message by 13 points, 50 percent to 37 percent. The second message won by a wider 17-point margin. The third message, which included the more progressive position on guns, triumphed by the widest margin, 22 points. None of the ballot tests included party affiliation for the candidates.

“I’m normally reluctant to write about issue polls,” Gonzales notes, “but this one is different.” Perhaps Gonzales should have stuck with his native skepticism. It’s tough to analyze the poll directly as there are no links to it in the Roll Call article, but we can ask who conducted the poll and on whose behalf. And suddenly, the claim about center-shifting starts to become a little less credible:

Guns Down and Center for American Progress commissioned a national poll of 1,000 registered voters via an online web panel, conducted June 12-16 by Democratic pollster Margie Omero of GBA Strategies, to test the effectiveness of various messages on the gun issue.

Ahem. A gun-control group combined with the leading progressive-activist political organizing group and hired a Democratic pollster, and … we’re surprised to find gun-control messaging suddenly becoming a winner? What were the odds, eh? How can a reporter for a news publication not be skeptical about these results?

Besides, the problem with these messaging polls is that so few Democrats remained informed and disciplined enough to explain them properly, let alone stick with them. The third message gets especially garbled because there really isn’t a definition of “assault weapons” that works, other than “semi-automatic rifles that look really scary.” The AR-15, for instance, is usually the weapon that gets the most mention, but it’s functionally no different than other semi-automatic rifles, and less powerful than some.

It’s one thing to air a slogan; it’s another thing to defend it when directly challenged. When that happens, gun-control candidates invariably start talking “automatic” weapons (already banned for almost all Americans), large capacity “magazine clips” (two different things), eventually leading to the always-hilarious argument that the Second Amendment really intended to only protect front-loading muskets. At the same time, it’s become painfully obvious that heavy gun control regulation fails in cities and states that impose them, such as Chicago, Washington DC, and so on.

It might still make for a successful message in places where Democrats already win. If they want to take those messages into the places where they’ve been on the ropes, I suspect that Republicans would be delighted to paint them honestly as the party that wants to take firearms away from law-abiding citizens.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...
Email, RSS Follow

Related

Subscribe to Taking on Issues

Enter your email address to subscribe to our site and receive notifications of new posts by email.

RSS Political News

  • 5 House Democrats took $60,000 trip to South Africa for Beyoncé concert, records show February 23, 2019
  • Robert Mueller's 'Collusion' Case So Far February 23, 2019
  • Dianne Feinstein scolds kids who pushed her to back Green New Deal: 'I know what I'm doing' February 23, 2019
  • U.S. Farmers Receive $7.7 Billion in Trade Aid to Date February 23, 2019
  • Trump Aides Worry he'll get Outfoxed in North Korea Talks February 23, 2019
  • Tax Law Helped Boost 2018 Bank Profits to Record Level February 23, 2019
  • 'I Believe in White Supremacy': John Wayne's 1971 Playboy Interview February 22, 2019
  • Voter fraud means new election in North Carolina February 22, 2019
  • Trump announces Kelly Knight Craft as nominee for UN ambassador February 22, 2019

Archives

New Featured Articles

  • Vatican: No, the Pope did not announce opposition to the Dakota Access pipeline
    February 15, 2017

    posted at 9:01 pm on February 15, 2017 by Ed Morrissey When is an invitation to the Vatican an endorsement? And when does a pontiff endorse domestic political positions? As the Vatican itself rushed to explain earlier today, the answer to both is rarely, if ever — but Pope Francis’ remarks at his meeting with an […]

    Email, RSS Follow
    […]
  • The Obama Change Unveiled
    March 17, 2010
    Obama Health Care|The Obama Change Politicians Can Do […]
  • Live: Foreign Policy in America’s Interest
    November 14, 2016
    Today The American Conservative gathers leading […]
  • Susan Rice in March: “I know nothing” of Devin Nunes’s claims about incidental surveillance of Trump staffers
    April 3, 2017
    posted at 3:31 pm on April 3, 2017 by Allahpundit Eli […]
  • Organizations and organisms
    March 19, 2017
    Last week we wrote in “America’s two […]
  • CNN mystery: Who took out a hit on the Godfather of Soul?
    February 5, 2019
    Twelve years ago, the death of James Brown was […]
  • NFL Week 2 open thread
    September 18, 2016
    posted at 12:31 pm on September 18, 2016 by Jazz Shaw […]
  • Do This, Don’t Do That|Is That Your Mother Or Your Government
    July 7, 2011
    Government Rule When the government starts banning […]
  • Up in smoke: Samsung throws in a $17B towel on the Note 7
    October 11, 2016
    posted at 10:01 am on October 11, 2016 by Ed Morrissey […]
  • The WIRE: Your week in review
    September 8, 2017
    From Chicagoland to the Rio Grande — and most […]
  • Feelbad story of the day: Victims of Vegas massacre being harassed, threatened by conspiracy theorists
    October 26, 2017
    I have no deep thoughts or hot takes for you about […]
  • The Last Intellectual Late-Night Talk Show
    June 27, 2018
    Once describing the appeal of his eponymous show in a […]
  • St. Vicente & The Benedict Option
    January 19, 2019
    I arrived back at my friends’ house in Madrid […]
  • Cultivating The Benedict Option
    November 21, 2016
    Here are text and photos by our friend James C., who […]
  • Report: FBI agent who interviewed Flynn prepared to testify he appeared forthcoming
    May 25, 2018
    The 2nd FBI agent who, along with Peter Strzok, […]
Copyright © 2019 TakingOnIssues.com

Contact Us | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Advertise | About Us