Maybe the Dems need to emphasize suburban issues like gun control more often. The vast majority of people live in the suburbs, and those who don't want to. You can't escape it.
I can't imagine that emphasising gun control is going to help in the suburbs more than it will hurt in blue collar, working-class district. I can't see many suburban GOP people switching over based on gun control.
I don't think a lot of these people are GOP people so to speak, they are more like independents or weak identifiers, maybe even Democrats who voted Republican once in a while based on taxes. What the Dems need to do is (locally) emphasize the issue. It's one more thing to talk about other than just economics.
Why? Gun control, as an issue, is dead in the Democratic party. How many candidates won this year in red districts who emphasized gun control?And how many lost in suburban districts who didn't emphasize gun control because they were afraid that it was a dead issue? Even though large majorities of the public, 60-70%, support more stringent security measures for guns?
There are no weapons that are as deadly as guns, generally speaking. Gun control opponents constantly try to stereotype gun control advocates as trying to "take away the guns," but that just isn't the case. Advocates want to make guns safer, and enact measures to make sure that criminals don't have easy access to them. The only ban enacted, a ban on assault weapons, proved to be very effective. The number of assault weapons traced to crime scenes dropped 45% after the enactment of the ban. According to one article, deaths caused by guns dropped from 38,505 in 1994 to 29,573 in 2001, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. While crime experts say the drop resulted from several factors, such as fewer gang shootings involving crack cocaine, they cite the assault weapons ban and other gun controls passed in 1993 and 1994 as among the causes.
I'm not saying Dems should emphasize gun control in every district. I'm just saying that districts are differently and not every district is vehemently opposed to gun control. In some (most) districts, it is favored.
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