The Political Consequences of Trump's Support for Armed Defense

Donald Trump came out in favor of armed defense of the individual and the Country on Wednesday, 18 November, 2015.  In an exclusive to Brietbart.com, Donald Trump has called for Americans to bear arms to increase the security of the United States.  From Brietbart.com:

There are nearly 13 million concealed carry permit holders in the United States who are part of the 100 million gun owners who defend the Constitutional right to “keep and bear arms.” This fundamental liberty is held closest by those who have gone through the process of vetting required to be entrusted with the ability to defend themselves, their families and their property with concealed weapons.

(snip)

 Each permit holder must make the decision to carry or not carry. I will carry more often than I have in the past, and I am sure other concealed permit holders will do the same. Do we have an obligation to carry? The answer is “yes,” but we must do it in such a way as to raise serious doubts in the minds of those who might be considering violence in America.

This is not much of a surprise; Trump has championed the Second Amendment in speeches and in his proposed policies for years.  This confounds political correctness, which makes the claim attempting to defend oneself or one's country is a fools errand that is only engaged in by those who believe in outdated ideologies, such as patriotism or Christianity.   President Obama's characterization of people who cling to their Bibles and their guns is "progressive" shorthand for such a view.

But those who hold such a politically correct view are a tiny minority of the population.  Trump has successfully connected with large majorities of the voting public.  Here are the results of a Gallup poll taken this year, about public attitudes about concealed carry:

That is a 15% advantage, and those are only the ones willing to buck the ongoing propaganda from the media cartel.  I suspect that it is a larger percentage in the privacy of the voting booth.

If you look at guns in the home, a 2014 poll shows and even greater disparity:

Americans see arms as providing more safety, not less, by a two to one margin.

This has been the historically prevalent view.  It was only challenged after World War One, as post WWI elites, worried about violent revolution, used mass media to sell the idea that being disarmed made people safer.  That idea has now been discredited.

The Gallup poll from 2014 shows that 81% of Republicans support armed defense, which shows the wisdom of Trump supporting this policy.  But so do 64% of Independents, and 41% of Democrats.  That translates into a blowout issue for a general election.

President Clinton confirmed that electoral reality when confronted with the Republican blowout in 1994.  Lack of support for the Second Amendment is widely credited with the loss of Al Gore's presidential bid in 2000.  That was with lukewarm support for the Second Amendment from candidate George W. Bush.  From pbs.org:

NEWSCASTER: What we found in an exit poll is gun owners— 40 percent of the voters in Ohio are gun owners, and they went almost 60 percent for George W. Bush.

NEWSCASTER: George W. Bush gets West Virginia—

NARRATOR: West Virginia—

NEWSCASTER: West Virginia, which has been solidly in the Democratic column for a long, long time—

NEWSCASTER: Bill Clinton’s home state has gone Bush—

NARRATOR: And Arkansas—

NEWSCASTER: —six electoral votes, and they go for Bush—

NARRATOR: And even Al Gore’s home state of Tennessee.

NEWSCASTER: —embarrassing Vice President Gore by snatching his state’s 11 electoral votes—

Image the differential created between Donald Trump, who proudly supports (and leads by example) the concept of armed defense, contrasted with Hillary, who denigrates and dismisses the concept altogether.

This issue creates a large positive voter advantage for Trump in both the Republican primary and the general election.

I expect other candidates will see the obvious advantages of this position, and will follow the Donald's lead.  If they do not, it may become impossible to overcome Donald Trump's momentum.

©2015 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.
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