Nate Silver: Gun Ownership Is A Powerful Political Predictor

[amborin]

Party Identity in a Gun Cabinet

".....about 40 percent of married households reported having a gun in their home, according to the exit poll conducted during the 2008 presidential election.

But the odds vary significantly based on the political identity of the child’s parents. If they identify as Democratic voters, the chances are only about one in four, or 25 percent, that they have a gun in their home. But the chances are more than twice that, almost 60 percent, if they are Republicans.

Whether someone owns a gun is a more powerful predictor of a person’s political party than her gender, whether she identifies as gay or lesbian, whether she is Hispanic, whether she lives in the South or a number of other demographic characteristics.

It will come as no surprise to those with a passing interest in American politics that Republicans are more likely to own guns than Democrats. But the differences have become much more stark in recent years, with gun ownership having become one of the clearest examples of the partisan polarization in the country over the last two decades......."



snip

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/18/in-gun-ownership-statistics-partisan-divide-is-sharp/?ref=todayspaper

[Atypical Liberal]

1. At it's heart, it's collective vs. individual action.

Conservatives tend to believe, right or wrong, in the power and liberty of the individual.

Yes, we know the fallacies of "boot straps" and the total disregard for all the benefits that individuals get by being part of a society.

Hand in hand with this belief in the individual is the idea of the individual having the personal and ultimate responsibility for their own safety, and a distrust, even resentment of having to rely on others to save them.

Liberals tend to have much more faith in collective action to solve problems. This includes safety. There is a strong distrust, even resentment of people defending themselves instead of relying on the police.

[Lemonwurst]

3. You make a very astute point

And have done it concisely without editorializing. Well done.

I have conservative acquaintances both sane and "off-the-rails". A desire for stark individualism in society vs. a strong collective does seem consistent for how my sane RW friends seem to think.

For the less sane ones, well, they simply rely on Fox News to do their thinking.

[Atypical Liberal]

8. Thanks. It is what makes me Atypical. :)

I tend to be liberal on most policy issues but believe in the individual right to self-defense. It's how I chose my user name.

[randome]

5. Yet there are more Republican military veterans than Democrats?

I did not expect to see that. I would have thought they were roughly equal.

And how can there be 63% Republican military veterans and 54% Republican non-military?

What am I missing?

[Atypical Liberal]

7. Republicans love them some sweet, sweet war. n/t

[petronius]

9. Each one of those bars is the rate of gun ownership within each one of those groups - the

various sets don't need to add up to 100%. For example, 63% of 'R veterans' own guns, and 54% of 'R not-vets' own guns...

[randome]

15. Got it. Thanks!

[Xithras]

2. And gun ownership is a leading reason for that political position.

There's nothing more infuriating than asking a moderate union member WHY he's a Republican, and getting "Because the Democrats want to take my guns away" as a response. I've had that discussion more times than I care to count.

[banned from Kos]

4. True. Gun bans are a political death wish in purple states.

That is why Feinstein and Machin are in front. They just won reelection.

[Xithras]

11. That's my real fear right now.

Democrats control the Senate. Republicans control the House. My fear is that Feinstein and her anti-gun colleagues will propose another gun ban and may even get it through the Senate. The Republicans will prevent it from going through the House, and nothing will be accomplished...EXCEPT: The Republicans will get to tell all of their constituents that "The Democrats tried to take your guns away, and we stopped them!"

That just reinforces their support on the right, and scares a lot of gun owning swing moderates (mostly blue collar hunters) to their side in the next election. It would be a repeat of 1994, except that we won't actually get a ban out of it. In 1994, we got an AWB, but it cost us control of Congress until 2001. If this isn't handled carefully, we could easily end up losing control of Congress again, only this time we won't even get any ban out of it.

There are far too many people screaming for full gun confiscation right now, and reactions like the one we got out of Sacramento yesterday really don't help either. We already know that "gun grabbing" is a losing proposition, so we need to figure out how to increase gun safety without presenting ourselves as confiscators.

[srican69]

6. I am proud to report that based on this - I belong to the subgroup LEAST LIKELY to own a gun

5% .. and 73% of us voted Democratic.


Take that NRA ...

[slackmaster]

10. Rather odd that Mr. Silver didn't provide statistics for mixed households

Such as the one I grew up in. We had three firearms in the house.

[bongbong]

12. This proves the lie

The Delicate Flowers like to claim that a lot of Democrats own guns.

Thanks, Nate.

[Puzzledtraveller]

13. It's a higher percentage than I thought myself

so doesn't it depend on who you ask as to how the results mesh with the conventional thinking?

[RZM]

14. 31 percent of Democratic households is a lot

Obama got over 65 million votes on election day. So that's about 20 million Obama voters in gun-owning households. I'd say that qualifies as a lot. 1/3 of a constituency isn't anything to sneeze at.

I'm not sure what that should mean going forward, but you seem to think 31 percent equals some sort of fringe presence, when that clearly isn't the case. Had just 10 percent of that 31 percent of Democrats voted the other way, we'd be talking about President-elect Romney right now.

[dmallind]

19. 31%? Thats about 30-odd million Dem gun owners. Not a lot? Really?

[bongbong]

20. The Delicate Flowers

Always implied or outright claimed a "majority" of Democrats owned a Precious.

[Cali_Democrat]

16. No wonder why there are so many conservatives in the gungeon. n/t

[Dawgs]

17. That's like saying that white men over fifty is a political predictor.

Nate Silver is getting rich off of stating the obvious, again.

[amborin]

18. one thing to observe apparent generalizations; it's another to provide supporting evidence for them