Good Democratic messaging here
The gun violence situation looks very bad in America right now. We’re averaging more than one mass shooting every day. One of the latest such shootings took place in Allen, Texas last Saturday, where a gunman wearing a tactical vest with an “RWDS” (“Right Wing Death Squad”) patch opened fire with an AR-15-style assault weapon at a shopping mall, killing at least eight people, including two young children, and injuring approximately nine others. Meanwhile, Republican-run states are going the wrong way on guns, with Florida passing a law allowing residents to carry concealed guns without a permit, and a 2015 tweet from Texas Governor Greg Abbott resurfacing again this week, in which he complains that Texas lags behind California in gun purchases, and that Texans therefore need to buy more guns. To top it off, Republican Megyn Kelly, who should know better about toxic harmful behavior, tweeted the following last Saturday:
Serious q for gun control advocates: you’ve failed to effect change. Pls face it. You can’t do it, thx to the 2A. We’re all well aware you don’t like that fact, but fact it is. What’s next? Must we just stay here sad, concerned, lamenting? Could we possibly talk OTHER SOLUTIONS?
Then, after being reprimanded for her tweet, she doubled down with the following:
No YOU F off. I am sick and tired of nothing changing after mass shootings bc we get mired EVERY TIME IN THE DAMN GUN DEBATE. You have LOST. It’s DONE. For the love of God what else can be done? You are ruining any chance at change by not admitting that the gun debate is lost.
But giving up on fighting gun violence is the last thing we should do. First of all, let’s take a lesson from the Republicans, as we suggested back in 2011, and go on offense. Specifically, when the U.S. Supreme Court decided in its 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that the Constitution provides for the right to an abortion, did the anti-choice Republicans give up? Quite the opposite! They embarked on an effort lasting nearly 50 years to fight that ruling, and they made steady progress at the federal level and in various states (waiting periods, parental consent, protests, closing clinics, late-term abortion bans, etc.), until, with the right combination of Republicans in the White House and the U.S. Senate to confirm enough right-wing justices, the Court overturned Roe v. Wade in its 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson ruling. Along the way, outlawing abortion became one of the Republicans’ chief unifying issues and rallying cries.
