With the midterm elections over for almost a month now – assuming you don’t count the endless recounts – you’d think the preening from the anti-gun zealots would be over. Especially since, from a historical perspective, they made modest gains at best.

But from anti-gunners, it’s a mandate to destroy civil liberties in this country.

Many Americans are hopeful that come January the newly elected Democratic majority in the House will work to keep guns out of the hands of potential mass shooters. Early signals on this front, however, give little cause for optimism. Two days after the midterm election Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the presumptive speaker, said House Democrats will prioritize “bipartisan legislation to have common-sense background checks” on firearm sales. The legislation she’s referring to is the Public Safety and Second Amendment Rights Protection Act, which would expand the existing background check system for gun buyers. This is not universal background check legislation; it would just cover private sales that are commercially advertised, such as at gun shows, over the internet or through classified ads. Worse, the bill includes National Rifle Association-drafted language that bars the federal government from registering privately held firearms. Given the overwhelming success of Democratic congressional candidates who championed gun control in the midterm elections, this feels like a weak lead for Pelosi and her caucus. The bill also suffers from a fundamental flaw: It relies on a system replete with dangerous loopholes.

However, the op-ed also goes on to paint the NRA as demons looking to arm criminals.

And really, what would an anti-gun op-ed be without one of those.

The gun lobby’s contribution to the Public Safety and Second Amendment Rights Protection Act — a ban on national firearms registration — is telling. The NRA knows that requiring a license to buy a gun and registration to keep one — with the training, testing and background investigation that would entail — is the most effective way to keep firearms out of the hands of violent individuals. In other democracies, this typically results in significantly lower rates of gun death and overall homicide than the U.S. Likewise, a just-published study from researchers at UC Davis and the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research concluded that a universal instant check system implemented in California did less to reduce homicide and suicide rates in the state than “permit-to-purchase” (licensing) laws in Connecticut and Missouri. Why? Because permit-to-purchase laws require gun buyers to deal directly with law enforcement agencies in their communities.

Holy crap, that’s amazing. That paragraph is a marvel to behold. I say this as someone who gets paid to write.

It’s impressive that they packed so much male bovine excrement in so few words.

First, yes, the research did find that universal background checks were useless. That’s where the actual truth ends.

There’s a reason we oppose permits to purchase, and it’s something that Skippy the Wonder Spud here is willfully ignoring. Requiring a permit to buy a gun is requiring a permit to exercise a fundamental civil right. It’s telling me that I have to beg for permission from law enforcement so that I can exercise my right to keep and bear arms, a right that is supposed to be beyond infringement.

That is why the NRA opposes them. It’s why the vast majority of gun rights advocates oppose them.

As for “other democracies,” I want to point out a few things to the author. One is that we’re not a freaking democracy, you vacuous twit. We’re a republic. The fact that you can’t get this simple fact through your skull is a clear illustration as to why you’re a gun control advocate. If you had an IQ above negative numbers, you might both understand this and realize gun control doesn’t work.

Second, those “other democracies” are nations which have very different cultural landscapes than that of the United States. They don’t have our variety of subcultures, cultural mores, and any number of other factors. They also have a fraction of our population and a fraction of our economy. In other words, it’s comparing apples to oranges.

But hey, when you’re running anti-gun propaganda, what use are facts?

The truth is that despite the author’s claims, gun control wasn’t the winning issue he may like to believe. A lot of vocally anti-gun candidates went down in defeat, such as Stacey Abrams and Andrew Gillum. Those that did win won not because of their anti-gun positions, but despite them.

Democrats did make gains in the midterms, but they were historically weak. The president’s party almost always loses ground in the midterms. However, they typically lose ground in both chambers, but this time the GOP picked up seats in the Senate.

Further, because of that fact, Pelosi is pushing a watered-down bill in some forlorn hope that maybe that will make it through the Senate. If Skippy here didn’t know, the House can’t pass anything without the Senate, and the Senate isn’t likely to support the author’s radical and unconstitutional agenda.

So yeah, gun control is still a loser issue for the Democrats, but please, by all means, push it.

The GOP will be happy to retake the House in two years.