for all these utterly bizarre deaths that keep happening on US soil, as a result
of their being so many guns, so totally available, to whoever wants to shoot
someone, OR to whoever happens to not be old enough to know what they are
doing as a 3 year old who finds pistol in mom's bag and shoots both mom and
dad with one shot.

This is getting so insanely out-of-control that it needs to be seriously litigated
to recover damages from the NRA for their thoughtless, greed-driven championing
of everyone who can fog a mirror having at least one, preferably an armory, of
lethal weaponry laying around, when they aren't picked up and used to kill yet
another innocent victim.

Oh wait, it will no doubt be appealed all the way up to SCOTUS.

Never mind.

and say they supported policies that led to a steady 20 year decline in gun deaths.

isn't that the real issue?

You throw that term around like other people use racial slurs, and since I've never heard you refer to any gun owner in a positive or even neutral way, I was wondering how you distinguish between a "gun nut" and a responsible "assault weapon" owner like Gabrielle Giffords or a gun enthusiast like Rachel Maddow? Or perhaps the tens of millions of other Democrats who are gun owners, including the ones like myself here at DU? Or do you just have a personal polarization on the issue that is not reflected by the reality of the situation?

"I think this issue is way more polarized in politics than it is in real life. Gun appreciation, even gun enthusiasm (which I confess to in a small way!) is absolutely not inconsistent with a belief in rational gun-safety reform." - Rachel Maddow