Best of all, the issue is a political winner. Not since Bull Connor turned the dogs on Martin Luther King, Jr., has fate provided us with so unattractive an adversary. The National Rifle Association, lest we forget, is the focus of evil in the modern world. Under its radical new leadership, the organization has gone off into positions so extreme that even a large section of its own membership finds them abhorrent. Though nine out of ten Americans want to see stricter gun control, Gucci-shoed NRA lobbyists have terrorized our legislatures and undermined the sanctity of our communities.
Ammunition lasts only a few years and is manufactured in bulk in only a few dozen factories.
Let's tax it out of existence, ban it, whatever. Pay off the workers' pensions and let the sportsmen keep their buckshot, but that's it. Such a movement is obviously not the answer to all of our problems. But more than any other solution, it does offer the potential to create a true progressive movement culture with a decidedly middle-class bent. Both men began as conservatives who inadvertently created a set of rising expectations, along with social movements, to transform them into irresistible demands.