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I’m seeing similiar numbers in local news phone polls. Its heartening. Even if its not ‘scientific’.

I believe 9/11 dramatically changed the public’s view of the Second Amendment. Thats what happens when you are fighting people that don’t believe there is such a thing as ‘civilians’ only ‘targets of opportunity’.

But 16 percent believe stricter controls of guns and ammunition would have prevented the tragedy.

Interestingly 16 percent of Americans also "speculate that secretly planted explosives, not burning passenger jets, were the real reason the massive twin towers of the World Trade Center collapsed" http://www.izzit.org/events/article3.php?ID=11

and 16 percent are "suspicious about the outcome" of the 2004 Presidential elections. http://www.unexplained-mysteries.com/viewnews.php?id=27589

Somewhat buried is that slightly more Americans believe a better-armed citizenry could prevent mass murders than believe stricter gun control would work.

Still, it's good to see some sanity in the public on this issue. I actually believe that on many issues, particularly gun control and immigration, the American public at large leans to the right. At the risk of making this a Rudy flamefest, I do think it highlights how Giuliani might be moderate on the wrong issues to make him more "electable". After all, many of the new Democrats elected to Congress, like their poster boy Jim Webb, ran as being anti-gun control and at least moderate, if not pro-enforcement, on illegal immigration. Webb, at least, appears to be in line with McCain on those issues, and to the right of Giuliani.

Polls like this, and another Zogby poll from late '05 (ZOGBY POLL SHOWS AMERICANS FAVOR BORDER CONTROL OVER GUN CONTROL, minutemanhq.com), suggest that independents and swing voters, just the sort a moderate-to-liberal Republican nominee is supposed to appeal to, is more in line with the Republican base than with the the Republican frontrunners on these key issues.

If our nominee touts his support for the war as his primary conservative credential, he will be emphasizing perhaps the least popular conservative position right now. I yield to no one in my support for victory in Iraq and elsewhere, but I'm politically aware enough to know I'm in the minority in America right now. While I believe that most of the pro-Rudy contingent is well meaning in wanting the best chance to elect a Republican, I believe they've taken a wrongheaded approach in promoting a candidate who bases his claim to the conservative label on those issues on which the public at large identifies with conservatives the least, while leaning to the left on issues where the public would actually be more sympathetic to the conservative position.

Just a thought.

"The tank, the B-52, the fighter-bomber, the state controlled police and the military are the weapons of dictatorship. The rifle is the weapon of democracy. Not for nothing was the revolver called an "equalizer." Egalite implies liberte. And always will. Let us hope our weapons are never needed--but do not forget what the common people knew when they demanded the Bill of Rights: An armed citizenry is the first defense, the best defense, and the final defense against tyranny... If guns are outlawed, only the government will have guns. Only the police, the secret police, the military, the hired servants of our rulers. Only the government--and a few outlaws. I intend to be among the outlaws." - Edward Abbey, The Right to Bear Arms, 1979.

The Second Amendment - Commentaries

But 16 percent believe stricter controls of guns and ammunition would have prevented the tragedy.

16 percent of the people believe MIHOP or LIHOP. 16 percent of the people don't believe we actually landed on the moon. 16 percent of the people would do just about anything for a Hollywood celebrity. I think it's the same 16 percent each time. At least 16 percent of people are just crazy.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1820535/posts

See above to see which Presidential contender is right in line with sensible American thinking on gun control. Excerpts:

“Virginia, like 39 other states, allows citizens with training and legal permits to carry concealed weapons. That means that Virginians regularly sit in movie theaters and eat in restaurants among armed citizens. They walk, joke and rub shoulders everyday with people who responsibly carry firearms — and are far safer than they would be in San Francisco, Oakland, Detroit, Chicago, New York City, or Washington, D.C., where such permits are difficult or impossible to obtain.
...
In recent years, however, armed Americans — not on-duty police officers — have successfully prevented a number of attempted mass murders. Evidence from Israel, where many teachers have weapons and have stopped serious terror attacks, has been documented. Supporting, though contrary, evidence from Great Britain, where strict gun controls have led to violent crime rates far higher than ours, is also common knowledge.

So Virginians asked their legislators to change the university’s “concealed carry” policy to exempt people 21 years of age or older who have passed background checks and taken training classes. The university, however, lobbied against that bill, and a top administrator subsequently praised the legislature for blocking the measure.

The logic behind this attitude baffles me, but I suspect it has to do with a basic difference in worldviews. Some people think that power should exist only at the top, and everybody else should rely on “the authorities” for protection....”