Why exactly is the NRA so powerful?

Its pretty obvious that any national politician who made a serious and practical attempt to impose any kind of gun control would get blown away by gun nuts.

That's a pretty big disincentive.

 

I'm trying to think of the last pro-NRA candidate who lost because of their voting record on guns. I've got nothing.

 

Politicians today are smarter than politicians 240 years ago. It doesn't seem that way because we only get the history book version of the 1770s folks.

 

I think I see what you're getting at with your whole statement, and you're right, there are just too many scary things when you start screwing around with the Constitution. But I will comment on this portion.

I'm in favor of stricter gun laws and I wish it were easier to enact reforms that could get us going in the right direction. I think the Fourth Amendment is fairly easy to understand and the courts have allowed the amendment to adapt as times have changed. The First Amendment has contracted and expanded over the years as we run into things we never thought would be an issue. The Second Amendment really needs to be the same way. Just cleaning up the wording or even expanding it to allow states and the feds to respond to threats would help. The Second Amendment needs to come out of the fronteer times and into the 21st century. But I wouldn't want to blow it up.

 

Add in that the NRA is well funded and very effective at lobbying. They have basically single-handedly changed the definition of Second Amendment rights over the last twenty five years or so. It's to the point that any law that would affect firearms in any way is reflexively opposed. It really does not matter if the proposed statute is good law that would help. "The gubmint's coming for your guns!" Hell, they've been milking the whole "Obama's gonna take your guns!" thing ever since he was elected. It's been great for sales.

Remember also that the NRA is de facto an arm of the firearms manufacturers, and is well funded by them.

Bottom line is that Republicans are scared to oppose the NRA because they know that it will buy them a primary challenge from the right, funded by the NRA. Democrats are scared of it because they will be demonized by the Republicans, funded by the NRA. In fairness, there are also many politicians who are also supporters of gun rights themselves and go along willingly.

 

All true, NC. For the past seven years, fear of losing gun rights has been the one unifying factor for the tea party/True-Believer Republicans, more than even abortion or Obamacare.

That's a great point about guns/ammo sales, too. You'd think sporting goods stores would be sending donations to the Clinton campaign, because her election will keep the fear purchases rolling.

 

They might be, on the sly. It is dead certain that if HRC is elected they'll run the exact same shell game.

There *is* something that the President can do by executive fiat. The USG, between the armed forces and the various federal law enforcement arms, accounts for roughly 25% of the arms and ammunition purchased domestically. He can put the squeeze on the manufacturers to implement whatever program is designed to punish arms retailers who are involved in straw purchases, to add safety features, to decrease magazine sizes, whatever - or the government will purchase from more cooperative manufacturers.

 

Government isn't any more dysfunctional than it always has been. Probably a lot less. We scream at each other on the internet over 5% differences in the tax rate. We used to go to bloody wars over whether it was OK to own people or not. Things are better than they've ever been. We just remember our politicians warts and forget those of the past.

OK, that aside, the question is "Do we believe in self-government, or don't we?" The people living under a form of government, through their duly elected representatives, should have all of the say in how that government is created. I'm leaning on Jefferson pretty heavily here, but what we have is what he described as "the tyranny of the dead." I didn't write the U.S. Constitution, nor did anyone representing me. That's equally true for every single person living under its jurisdiction. That's a problem.

 

There's also a process to add things to, or change things in, the Constitution.
Don't like the second amendment? Begin the process to change it. If it's too difficult to do that successfully, there's a reason why.
As I said, there are a lot of good things in the Constitution. Things that go beyond the Bill of Rights. It's the single biggest reason we've survived for 226 years when so many other countries have had regular bouts of upheaval. One group -- no matter how large or well-intentioned their motives -- disagreeing with part of it is not a reason to throw it in the shredder and start over.

 

It took three months to draft the current Constitution. I don't know how long a new one would take. It took seven years just to pass a comprehensive highway bill.

 

Yes. The reason it is too difficult is because it was designed with 13 states in mind, not 50. Getting 10/13 is a lot easier than getting 38/50. That is the reason we have seen steadily fewer amendments over the years and have been forced to adopt the judicial overreach model of major change.

The single reason we've survived for 226 years is because we wiped out the indigenous population and took over the useful half of a fortress continent separated from most of the developed world by two huge oceans. We spent most of those 226 just exploiting the natural resources, then got a huge boost for the last 1/3rd when every other manufacturing power destroyed itself in wars that couldn't touch us outside of some planes bombing Pearl Harbor, leaving us with an effective monopoly that we got 6 decades of prosperity out of. We chose to believe that good fortune was the result of our exceptionalism and God smiling on us, as people tend to do when faced with their own averageness covered up by positive circumstances.