For the record: I love kids (especially my grandkids), I lived in the city adjacent to Newtown for 7 years, and I’m definitely not a gun hawk – I’ve never owned one, never shot one and don’t plan to do either.
I think most people are reading this week’s gun control vote all wrong.
First, it’s repeatedly reported that 80% to 90% of Americans support background checks.
That’s probably true, but a practical overstatement because “while about 80 percent of those Americans think that background checks sound like a reasonable idea, they don’t really care much … only 4 percent of Americans consider guns to be the “most important” issue facing the country.” NRO
Second, I think that President Obama had it right a couple of weeks ago when he pitched: “People say they don’t trust the government. But, we are the government.”
Yep, he has it right … people don’t trust government.
At least the Federal government.
Here’s some evidence …
A recent Pew survey shows that trust in government took a major hit during the Johns0n-Nixon-Ford-Carter years … and has been cycling around the 30% mark since … currently, a little over 20% of the population trusts the government.
Think about that for a moment …
Even assuming that – at an extreme – no Republicans trust the current administration … it means that less than half of all Democrats trust the administration.
Hmmm.
Here are some more interesting nums …
The Homa Files 