Trump hasn’t gone over to the gun-controllers’ side-he’s still politically aligned with the NRA.

If gun control views have shifted recently or momentum seems to have moved to the gun-controllers’ side, we should give the president some of the credit or the blame, depending on where you stand on the issue. Walmart, Fred Meyer and Dick’s Sporting Goods have raised the minimum age to buy ammunition to 21 and Dick’s gathered headlines by announcing it would no longer sell assault-style rifles (although cynics pointed out that the company did the same in 2013, only to recommence sales later). Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and the NRA’s Dana Loesch, and which, to my eyes and ears, redounded to the gun control advocates’ advantage. CNN staged and broadcast a two-hour “ town hall“ gun control discussion that pitted the parents of the victims and the survivors of the Parkland shooting against Sen. Scores of corporations have distanced themselves from the NRA, even though it has caused their unfavorable ratings to rise. Republicans representing competitive suburban districts have signaled they might vote for new gun measures such as higher age limits, stronger background checks, closer police monitoring of mentally ill or menacing individuals. That this shooting, as opposed to the others, would move public and political opinion comes as a surprise. It wasn’t even the first mass shooting of the Trump era-gunmen recently struck Sutherland Springs, Texas, and Las Vegas, extinguishing a total of 83 lives. The Parkland shooting was no more deadly than the previous attacks, and it was hardly the first time a school had fallen into a killer’s cross hairs.

Is the implausible on its way to becoming inevitable? Even President Donald Trump, who romanced the NRA during the campaign and was elected with its help, sounds like a gun-grabber these days. Call it a mirage or attribute it to liberal wishful thinking, but the gun control argument has found new grounding in the culture and is asserting a firmer grip in political circles. But as the wheel turns once more, something new has crept into the national disputation. In the aftermath of the Parkland killings, these patterns have asserted themselves.

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