I think there has been a major change.
And, it is for the better for us. This is a personal opinion, of course--but here's what I've noted in the last few months:
1.
The election of Obama has driven a major expenditure on firearms and ammunition, with many first-time buyers, period. Literally, millions of buyers of firearms. We have no way of knowing who the first time buyers are, but we keep getting anecdotal reports (here, in other forums). That suggests to me a major underlying support for the 2nd Amendment, and it was driven by the general media reporting of Heller.
2.
Traction for gun control as a political tool has not been gained during or following a month of over-reported shootings--the so-called 'mass murders' in Binghampton, etc. There are NO fast-track bills in Congress, etc.--only NY State seems to be doing this.
3.
Two annual polls about "Gun Control" have extremely positive results for anti-gun-control enthusiasts: A Gallup Poll, done last fall, showed a continued decline in public support for new gun control. Interestingly, Gallup (Democrat-Party-biased) did not report these results until April. Then, in the last two weeks, a Rassmussen poll done about the first week in April (i.e., after the MSM frenzy over mass shootings) showed the same result--
public interest in new laws for gun control is at its lowest point in forty years.
here is a link to the Gallup poll, and
here is the link to the Rasmussen poll. Finally,
here is a summary of a third--the CNN Poll (which I believe is the superset of the Rassmussen Poll) in a Seattle PI overview.
4.
The changing nature of newspapers to online producers of news has provided a wonderful tool for the anti-gun-control public--and we are taking full advantage of that. This tool is the "comments" feature allowing response to a certain news story, article, or opinion and appended to the report itself.
Many of us have read these articles and coments--indeed, we've responded in them. But what I now see, particularly for the 'unmoderated' responses, is that pro-gun-control posters immediately jump in with articulate, well-reasoned counters to the claims being put forth.
If the comments section is moderated, we probably see more of the "redneck" comments variety, particularly in publications with a known liberal bias. But for the hundreds and probably thousands of the smaller, regional newspapers (understaffed, and under tremendous economic stress), they are not--and posters are taking advantage of it. Helmke just received a profile interview in his original home-town paper, Fort Wayne--and, when I read it, four articulate comments refuting his comments appeared.
here is the article--see the comments.
The point is, after decades of non-reporting of gunny / pro-gun POVs, we now have a reasonable way to present our arguments--and it has to have a major impact in the long run.
Jim H.
