"the individual right to bear arms is an important part of the American tradition"

[cthulu2016]

I got curious as to what the Democratic Party itself thinks about guns, and checked the 2012 party platform.

It appears that the key is to keep guns from "the hands of those irresponsible, law-breaking few." Too bad the platform doesn't give a hint who those few bad apples might be. Seriously... the platform might as well just say, "guns don't kill people, people kill people." It's not the guns, it's that darn law-breaking few.

Huh... it turns out that the 2nd Amendment establishes a individual right, so all that well regulated militia stuff is out.

Favors restoring the AWB and closing gun show loophole. That seems to be the only policy proposed. The rest is boilerplate nothing-speak—Life is precious and our time here is short. Enforce existing laws. Reasonable regulation.

This is a polite endorsement of the status quo, with a couple of long-standing policy points. I don't see anything here Antonin Scalia couldn't sign off on. (I don't recall the judicial history of the AWB, so maybe Scalia objects to that.)

Mostly what I see is that the two parties probably do not offer the kind of polar opposition on guns that one finds on choice, or marriage equality in the 2012 platform.

We recognize that the individual right to bear arms is an important part of the American tradition, and we will preserve Americans' Second Amendment right to own and use firearms. We believe that the right to own firearms is subject to reasonable regulation. We understand the terrible consequences of gun violence; it serves as a reminder that life is fragile, and our time here is limited and precious. We believe in an honest, open national conversation about firearms. We can focus on effective enforcement of existing laws, especially strengthening our background check system, and we can work together to enact commonsense improvements—like reinstating the assault weapons ban and closing the gun show loophole—so that guns do not fall into the hands of those irresponsible, law-breaking few.

http://www.democrats.org/democratic-national-platform

[doc03]

1. There is nothing there I can disagree with. n/t

[cthulu2016]

2. .