Douthat on Guns and Prohibition

I am not entirely comfortable agreeing with Russ Douthat about things.

Douthat seems sane, and seems like a nice guy...and those two things alone are sufficient to make him one of the best conservative columnists in the country...but just about every time I read something he's written I disagree with him. So when I do agree with him, it makes me want to check my reasoning...

But agree with him I do, this time, at least.

Here's one point I thought was right on target, in response to Adam Gopnik's claim that resistance to gun control is a peculiarly American type of political madness:

 ...take it from a social conservative with a fair amount of experience in potentially lost causes: When you find yourself on the losing side of an argument that you used to be winning, accusing your opponents of being lunatics and nihilists isn’t usually the ideal way to turn the tide.

Word, Russ.

Firearm owners are not crazy, and the view that the populace should be armed in order to be able to resist a tyrannical government is not a crazy position. It's a position that is problematic--very problematic--but it is not insane.