Sen. Dianne Feinstein has an F rating from the NRA. It makes you wonder what the NRA would rate a politician who proposed an assault weapons bill that doesn’t protect gun owners by “exempting more than 900 specific hunting and sporting weapons.” For a rough comparison, try to imagine if staunchly pro-life Senators favored federally financed abortions on demand during the first trimester of pregnancy.

Feinstein has not released all of her proposed bill’s specifics but in her short, remarkable press release it appears closely modeled on the federal assault weapons ban that was in effect from 1994 until 2004. Feinstein finds “A Justice Department study found the Assault Weapons Ban was responsible for a 6.7 percent decline in total gun murders. However, since the 2004 expiration of the bill, assault weapons have been used in at least 459 incidents, resulting in 385 deaths and 455 injuries.” In other words, after a national trauma that supposedly changed the debate, an anti-gun Senator can only argue for a bill that might reduce gun murders by 6.7 percent.

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In this context it’s useful to read this paragraph from The Economist about what real change in gun regulation would look like. The London-based publication is not known for extremism, but in the context of the American gun debate it qualifies as a wild-eyed, foil hatted fanatic: