The GOP must be betting their voters have a pretty short memory. Because a single news cycle, maybe two, tops, seems to be about the modern GOP’s attention span for discussing gun violence.
Which, actually, sort of makes sense.
What if Republicans actually acted on their “solutions?”
Imagine a world in which GOP leaders like Ted Cruz or Former President Trump were forced to really engage with their disingenuous “solutions” for mass shootings.
Really imagine it: a world in which, faced with the repeated mass murders of innocent Americans, GOP leadership was forced to really grapple with a constituency who demanded accountability. What would America look like if core GOP voters actually expected their leaders to take literally any action to address the so-called “causes” they’ve identified?
In the immediate aftermath of last week’s massacre in Uvalde there was plenty of indignation on the Right about…doors, and the supposed breakdown of the nuclear family, and mental health and, well, pretty much any other topic they could use to grandstand while definitely not talking about guns when it comes to the “causes” of mass shootings.
And indeed, some in local media are asking questions of their Republican overseers. John M. Crisp of the Tribune News Service notes the following in his recent piece Our Gun Problem is Actually a Governance Problem:
“Republicans have been in charge of Texas since 1994, the last year a Democrat won a statewide election. If Abbott knows that a 40-county area surrounding Uvalde has no mental health care facilities, why aren’t Texas Republicans responsible for that failure?
And if school “hardening” is the answer, why haven’t schools in Texas been hardened?”
It’s easier to hide than to engage
Of course, no action will be taken by Congress w/r/t mass shootings. Not only will there be no assault weapons ban, like the one adopted in Canada this week, there will be no action on “mental health,” no crackdown on “fatherlessness,” no all-out pressure campaign to end the scourge that is…”doors.”
This is because it’s easier to hide than to engage, easier to distract than to legislate.
Easier to complain about (but also do absolutely nothing to solve) gas prices and baby formula shortages than it is to get bogged down in complex and nuanced issues like stopping mass shootings in this country.
That gas-price post above is one of dozens, and dozens, on Representative Jim Jordan’s Twitter timeline. Take a quick scroll through his feed, if you fancy. And, if you could, let me know in the comments if Rep. Jordan, even once, mentions that his own chamber of Congress just passed an anti-price-gouging bill, giving the “Federal Trade Commission the authority to investigate energy companies for alleged price gouging as prices at gas pumps nationwide hit record highs,” but not only did he not rush to the floor in support of helping everyday Ohioans struggling at the pumps, he voted “nay” on it himself.
This is the pattern in today’s GOP. Blame, actively exacerbate, blame some more.
Fake outrage
Another example: how about all that fake-outrage and hand wringing over the baby formula shortage? (The above tweet is one of hundreds by GOP accounts, all whinging in lockstep, almost as if by coordinated plan…)
How many in GOP leadership have acknowledged the critical role the Trump administration played with its disastrous trade policies removing the safety nets that could have blunted the impact of a formula recall in America? I’ll answer. None. Or. certainly next to none.
This is because the playbook has been the same for the entire Biden administration: identify a problem, grandstand about it in front of constituents about it, blame Biden, Democrats, socialism and communism and Hitler, then actively work to make the problem worse. This, so they can blame Biden again, and Democrats, and on and on. Wash, rinse, repeat.