Maybe the gun lobby is panicking because history is not on its side. Since 1994, the number of hunters in the United States has fallen to about 15 percent. As Kurt Andersen noted in his book “Fantasyland: How America Went Haywire ,” just 3 percent of Americans own roughly half of the country’s guns. Three out of four Americans do not even own a gun.

The NRA and Trump’s Republican Party face a political landscape where neither history nor poll numbers are on their side. Americans want stronger background checks, a ban on bump stocks and assurances that military-style weapons will stop finding their way into the hands of terrorists, domestic abusers and the mentally ill.

Poll after poll proves I am not the one out of touch. Conservative voters, rank-and-file Republicans and an overwhelming number of Americans share these views. GOP politicians and the gun lobbyists they represent live in a bubble. Their indifference to the massacres of innocents will lead to their political ruin. Then, and only then, can we have an honest debate on the epidemic of guns in America.