I jump to another crime-related issue, and that has to do with the national Republican Party and guns. At the basest level, where politicians tend to live, you’d think the GOP would be trying to situate itself as the party of wise adults to help summon those Democrats looking for a new home.

Congressional Republicans argue, compellingly, that there is a mental-health crisis in America, especially among young men. But do they listen to themselves when they say this? Because at the same time many are suggesting they will refuse to ban 18-year-olds, with their unsturdy emotions and unformed brains, from buying assault weapons such as AR-15s. Does that make any sense? It’s as if they’re saying, “We know you’ve been rendered mentally ill by the society and culture in which you’ve been raised. Therefore we’re going to make sure you can legally obtain super-weapons to kill people.”

This is proof of a mental-health crisis in the U.S. Senate. The opposition to red-flag laws is the same: We know there’s a pandemic of raw and violent instability, but it might potentially, theoretically and temporarily compromise someone’s rights if local cops, on being tipped you were displaying assault weapons on TikTok with the words, “Say hello to my little friends,” were allowed to check you out and, for a short time, confiscate your weapons. So we say no.

Don’t they know what time it is? This is a nation in all kinds of crises. You can’t let your theories and abstractions have sway at such a moment, you have to let common sense step in.