(Never mind that the "little children" often turn out to be 18-year-old gang members who don't buy their street-fightin' hardware legally in the first place. Never mind that children — and women, and everyone else — are never as much in jeopardy of mass murder as when evil men are armed, and good men defenseless against them — see Germany, Russia, China and Laos in the 20th Century. See Mexico today.)

The problem is that when self-styled conservatives hold a majority in Washington, they seem reluctant to play the same kind of hardball.

Unless pushed, many congresscritters figure it's safer to talk much and do little. And congressmen are absurdly sensitive to being called "extreme" by The Washington Post — a big-government rag rarely seen back in their home districts. (There are more moderate alternatives to this leftist organ of the Democrat Party and their public-employee unions. A modest expenditure to see every congresscritter's office receives a few copies each day of the colorful New York Post and/or the reasonably balanced Wall Street Journal might be money well spent.)